Wicked war with its wickedness was done at last. "The greatest evil
that can befall a country," some call it, and yet out of this end
came three great goods: The interstate distrust had died away, for
now they were soldiers who had camped together, who had "drunk from
the same canteen"; little Canada, until then a thing of shreds and
scraps, had been fused in the furnace, welded into a young nation,
already capable of defending her own. England, arrogant with long
success at sea, was taught a lesson of courtesy and justice, for
now the foe whom she had despised and insulted had shown himself
her equal, a king of the sea-king stock. The unnecessary battle
of New Orleans, fought two weeks after the war was officially closed,
showed that the raw riflemen of Tennessee were more than a match for
the seasoned veterans who had overcome the great Napoleon, and thus
on land redeemed the Stars and Stripes.
The war brought unmeasured material loss on all concerned, but some
weighty lasting gains to two at least. On December 24, 1814, the
Treaty of Ghent was signed and the long rides were hung up on the
cabin walls.
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