mentioned his arrest and trial before the Federal Court, on a charge of "treasonable practices" and "a design to attack the Spanish dominions, and thereby endanger the peace of the United States," of which he was acquitted. ments, and waylaying the river, a little above the town, took possession of them all but one, which the superior management of the young men from Belprie enabled them to bring by all the guards, in the darkness of the night, and reach the island in safety. Had they all escaped, they would have been of little use, as the young men engaged had generally given up the enterprise, on the news of the President's Proclamation and the Act of the Ohio Legislature. But all this would not satisfy Mr. Graham. He visited the Governor at Chillicothe, laid before him the surmises of Mr. Jefferson; and the Legislature, then in session, on the second day of December, with closed doors, passed an act, authorizing the Governor to call out the militia, on his warrant to any sheriff or militia officer, with power to arrest boats on the Ohio river, or men supposed to be engaged in this expedition, who might be held to bail in a sum of 50,000 dollars or imprisoned, and the boats confiscated: $1000 were placed at the disposal of the Governor, to carry out the law. Under this act a company of militia was called out, with orders to capture and detain the boats and provisions on the Muskingum, with all others descending the Ohio under suspicious circumstances. They were placed under the command of Captain Timothy Buell. A six-pounder was planted in battery, on the bank of the Ohio at Marietta, and every descending boat examined. Regular sentries and guards were posted for several weeks, until the river was closed with ice, and all navigation ceased. Many amusing jokes were played off on the military during this campaign, such as setting an empty tar barrel on fire and placing it on an old boat or raft of logs, to float by on some dark, rainy night. The sentries, after hailing and receiving no answer, fired several shots to enforce their order; but finding the supposed boat escaping, sent out a file of men to board and take possession, who, approaching in great wrath, were still more vexed to find it all a hoax. On the 6th of December, just before the order of the government arrived, Comfort Tyler, a gentleman from the State of New York, landed at the island, with four boats, and about thirty men, fitted out at the towns above on the Ohio. On the ninth, a party of young men from Belprie went up the Muskingum to assist in navigating the battered a party of men to watch the river teaux and provisions of parched meal, from that place to the island. But the militia guard received notice of their move Mr. Blennerhassett was at Marietta on the 6th of December, expecting to receive the boats, but they were not quite ready for delivery. On that day he heard of the Act of Assembly, and returned to the island, half resolved to abandon the cause; but the arrival that night of Tyler, and the remonstrances of his wife, who had entered with great spirit into the enterprise, prevented him. Had he listened to the dictates of his own mind, and the suggestions of prudence, it would have saved him years of misfortune and final ruin. In the course of the day of the 9th of December, he had notice that the Wood county militia had volunteered their services, and would that night make an attack on the island, arrest him with the boats and men there assembled, and perhaps burn his house. This accelerated their departure, which took place on the following night. They had learned that the river was watched at several points below, and felt serious apprehensions for their future safety; although the resolute young men on board, well armed with their rifles, would not have been captured by any moderate force. The Ohio river, from the Little to the Big Kenawha, is very crooked and tortuous, making the distance by water nearly double that by land. Col. Phelps, the commander of the Wood county volunteers, took possession of the island the following morning, and finding the objects of his search gone, determined not to be foiled, and started immediately on horseback across the country, for Point Pleasant, a village at the mouth of the Big Kenawha, and arrived there several hours before the boats. He directly mus all night, and arrest the fugitives. It being quite cold, with some ice in the stream, large fires were kindled, for the double purpose of warning the guard, and more | rifle through the ceiling of the large hall, easily discovering the boats. Just before daylight the men, being well filled with whiskey to keep out the cold, became drowsy with their long watch, and all lay down by the fire. During their short sleep, the four boats seeing the fires, and aware of their object, floated quickly by, without any noise, and were out of sight before the guard awoke. They thus escaped this well-laid plan for their capture -arriving at the mouth of the Cumberland, the place of rendezvous, unmolested. On the 13th, Mr. Morgan Neville and Mr. Robinson, with a party of fourteen young men,arrived and landed at the island. They were immediately arrested by the militia before the return of Col. Phelps. A very amusing account of the adventure is given in the "Token," an Annual of 1836, written by Mr. Neville, in which he describes their trial before Justices Wolf and Kincheloe, as aiders and abettors in the treason of Burr and Blennerhassett. So far was the spirit of lawless arrest carried, that one or two persons in Belprie were taken at night from their beds, and hurried over on to the island for trial, without any authority of law. This was a few days before the celebrated move in the Senate of the United States for the suspension of the act of Habeas Corpus, so alarmed had they become, which was prevented by the more considerate negative of the House of Representatives. After a detention of three days, these young men were discharged for want of proof. Mrs. Blennerhassett, who had been left at the island, to look after the household goods, and follow her husband at a more convenient period, was absent at Marietta when they landed for the purpose of procuring one of the large boats, that was fitted up for her use, and had been arrested at Marietta; but he was unsuccessful, and returned the evening after the trial. The conduct of the militia, in the absence of their commander, was brutal and outrageous; taking possession of the house and the family stores in the cellar, without any authority, as their orders only extended to the arrest of Mr. Blennerhassett and the boats. They tore up and burnt the fences for their watch fires, and forced the black servants to cook for them or be imprisoned. One of them discharged his the bullet passing up through the chamber near where Mrs. B. and the children were sitting. The man said it was accidental; but being half drunk, and made brutal by the whiskey they drank, they cared little for their actions. On the 17th of December, with the aid of the young men, and the kind assistance of Mr. A. W. Putnam of Belprie, one of their neighbors, and a highly esteemed friend, she with her children was enabled to depart, taking with her a part of the furniture and some of her husband's choice books. Mr. Putnam also furnished her with provisions for the voyage, her own being destroyed by the militia, in whose rude hands she was forced to leave her beautiful island home, which she was destined never again to visit. They kept possession for several days after her departure, living at free quarters, destroying the fences, letting in the cattle, which trampled down and ruined the beautiful shrubbery of the garden, barking and destroying the nice orchards of fruit trees, just coming into bearing; and this too was done by men, on many of whom Mr. Blennerhassett had bestowed numerous kindnesses. It is due to the commander, Col. Phelps, to say, that these excesses were mostly perpetrated in his absence, and that on his return, he did all he could to suppress them, and treated Mrs. Blennerhassett with respect and kindness. This spot, which, a short time before, was the abode of peace and happiness, adorned with all that could embellish or beautify its appearance, was now a scene of ruin, resembling the ravages of a hostile and savage foe, rather than the visitation of the civil law. Before leaving the island, Mr. Blennerhassett, not expecting to return, had rented it to Col. Cushing, one of his worthy Belprie friends, with all the stock of cattle, crops, &c. He did all in his power to preserve what was left, and prevent further waste. Col. Cushing kept possession of the island one or two years, when it was taken out of his hands by the creditors, and rented to a man who raised a large crop of hemp. The porticoes and offices were stowed full of this combustible article, when the black servants, during one of their Christmas gambols in 1811, accidentally set it on fire, and the whole mansion was consumed. The furniture and library, a portion of which only was removed with the family, was attached and sold at auction at a great sacrifice, to discharge some of the bills endorsed by him for Aaron Burr a few months after his departure. With her two little sons, Herman and Dominic, the one six, and the other about eight years old, she pursued her way down the Ohio to join her husband. The young men, her companions, afforded every aid in their power to make her situation comfortable, but the severity of the weather, the floating ice in the river, and the unfinished state of her cabin, hastily prepared for her reception, made the voyage a very painful one. Late in December, she passed the mouth of the Cumberland, where she had hoped to find her husband, but the flotilla had proceeded out of the Ohio into the rapid waters of the Mississippi, and landed at the mouth of the Bayou Piere, in the Mississippi territory. The Ohio was frozen over soon after the boat in which she was embarked left it, and was not again navigable until the last of February, the winter being one of great severity. Early in January she joined the boats of Col. Burr a few miles above Natchez, and was again restored, with her two little boys, to her husband, who received them with joy and gratitude from the hands of their gallant conductors. The whole country being roused from Pittsburgh to New Orleans, and the hue and cry raised on all sides to arrest the traitors, Col. Burr abandoned the expedition as hopeless, and assembling his followers, now about one hundred and thirty in number, made them a spirited speech, thanked them for their faithful adherence amidst so much opposition, and closed by saying that unforeseen circumstances had occurred which frustrated his plans, and the expedition was at an end. All were now left, at a distance of 1000 or 1500 miles from their homes, to shift for themselves. Several of the young men from Belprie, six or eight in number, returned in the course of the spring. Two brothers, Charles and John Dana, remained and settled near the Walnut Hills, purchased lands and entered into the cultivation of cotton. Some time in January, Col. Burr and Mr. Blennerhassett were arrested, and brought before the United States Court at Natchez, on a charge of treason, and recognized to appear in February. Blennerhassett did appear, and was discharged in chief, no proof appearing to convict him of any treasonable design. Burr did not choose to appear, but soon after the recognizance, he requested John Dana, with two others, to take him in a skiff, or row-boat, to a point about twenty miles above Bayou Piere, and land him in the night, intending to escape across the country by land. The better to conceal his person from detection, before starting, he exchanged his nice suit of broadcloth clothes and beaver hat with Mr. Dana, for his coarse boatman's dress and old slouched white wool hat, which would effectually disguise him from recognition by his intimate acquaintance. He proceeded safely for some days, but was finally arrested on the Tombigbee river, and with many taunts and insults taken into Richmond, where he arrived the 26th of March, 1807. No bill was found by the grand jury until the 25th of June, when he was indicted on two bills, one for treason, and the other for a misdemeanor. After a long and tedious trial he was acquitted, on a verdict of "Not Guilty." Mr. Blennerhassett, supposing himself discharged from further annoyance, some time in June, started on a journey to visit the island, and examine into the condition of his property, which, from various letters, he learned was going fast to waste and destruction. Passing through Lexington, Kentucky, where he had many friends and acquaintances, he was again arrested, on a charge of treason, and for some days confined in the jail, as an indictment had been found against him, as well as Burr, at Richmond. He employed Henry Clay as his council, who expressed deep indignation at the illegality of his client's arrest. "He had been discharged already in chief, and why should he be again arrested on the same supposed offence?" But the government was unrelenting, and nothing but the conviction of the offenders could appease their wrath. He was taken, with much ceremony and parade of the law, to Richmond, where he again met Burr, the originator of all his troubles and misfortunes. The magnanimity of the man is well shown, in that he never recriminated, or accused his destroyer with deceiving him, inasmuch as he had entered voluntarily into his plans, and therefore did not choose to lay his troubles on the shoulders of another, although it is apparent, that if he had never seen Aaron Burr, he would have escaped this sudden ruin to his prosperity and happiness. The following letter is from the pen of Mrs. Blennerhassett, addressed to her husband at Lexington, and displays her noble and elevated mind, as well as her deep conjugal affection. It is copied from the sketch of Mr. Blennerhassett by Wm. Wallace, published in Vol. II. of the American Review, 1845: "Natchez, August 3d, 1807. "MY DEAREST LOVE:-After having experienced the greatest disappointment in not hearing from you for two mails, I at length heard of your arrest, which afflicts and mortifies me, because it was an arrest. I think that had you of your own accord gone to Richmond and solicited a trial, it would have accorded better with your pride, and you would have escaped the unhappiness of missing my letters, which I wrote every week to Marietta. God knows what you may feel and suffer on our accounts, before this reaches to inform you of our health and welfare in every particular; and knowing this, I trust and feel your mind will rise superior to every inconvenience that your present situation may subject you to-despising as I do the paltry malice of the upstart agents of government. Let no solicitude whatever for us, damp your spirits. We have many friends here, who do the utmost in their power to counteract any disagreeable sensation occasioned me by your absence. I shall live in the hope of hearing from you by the next mail, and entreat you, by all that is dear to us, not to let any disagreeable feelings on account of our separation, enervate your mind at this time. whose destination was the Spanish territory." He did not appear, nor was he ever called upon again; and thus ended this treasonable farce, which had kept the whole of the United States in a ferment for more than a year, and like "the mountain in labor, at last brought forth a mouse." After the trial at Richmond in 1807, he returned to Natchez, where he staid about a year, and then bought, with the remains of his fortune, a plantation of one thousand acres, in Claiborne county, Mississippi, seven miles distant from Gibson Port, at a place called St. Catharines, and cultivated it with a small stock of slaves. While here he continued his literary pursuits, leaving Mrs. Blennerhassett to superintend both indoors and out. The embargo destroyed all commerce, and the war which soon followed put a stop to the sale of cotton, and blasted his hopes of reinstating his fortune from that source. In a letter to his attorney at Marietta, in 1808, wherein he proposes the sale of his island for slaves, he says, that with thirty hands on his plantation, he could in five years clear $60,000 : cotton was then in demand, and brought a high price. His lady, with her characteristic energy, rose at early dawn, mounted her horse and rode over the grounds, examining each field, and giving directions to the overseer, as to the work to be done that day, or any alteration to be made in the plans, which circumstances required. They here had the society of a few choice friends in Natchez, and among the neighboring planters. On this plantation they passed ten years, in which time one son and a daughter were added to the number of their children. The daughter died when young. Remember that all here will read with great interest anything concerning you; but still do not trust too much to yourself: consider your want of practice at the bar, and do not spare the fee of a lawyer. Apprise Col. Burr of my Retaining still a fond recollection of his warmest acknowledgments for his own and Marietta and Belprie friends, he in the Mrs. Alston's kind remembrance, and tell him year 1818 sent one of his sons to the colto assure her she has inspired me with a warmth of attachment which never can dimin-lege in Athens, Ohio, under the care of W. ish. I wish him to urge her to write to me. "God bless you, prays your "M. BLENNERHASSETT." On Burr's acquittal, Mr. Blennerhassett was never brought to trial, but discharged from the indictment for treason, and bound over in the sum of $3000 to appear at Chillicothe, Ohio, on a misdemeanor, "for that whereas he prepared an armed force, P. Putnam, the son of his old friend, A. W. Putnam. Here he remained a year; at the end of which time, finding his fortune still decreasing, and means much cramped. by his endorsements for Col. Burr, amounting to thirty thousand dollars, ten thousand of which were repaid by Mr. Alston, he in 1819 sold his plantation and moved his family to Montreal; the Governor of the province, an old friend, having given him hopes to expect a post on the Bench, for | Havoc and ruin, and rampant war, have past which he was well qualified. Over that Isle, with their destroying blast. Misfortune having marked him for her own, soon after his arrival, his friend was removed from office, and his expectations frustrated. He remained here until the year 1822, when he removed his family to England, under an assurance of a post from the government, which was never realized, and resided in the town of Balb with a maiden sister. It was while at Montreal, with prospects of poverty and blighted hopes thickening around her, that Mrs. Blennerhassett wrote those beautiful and touching lines describing the island," and her once happy home, which are given below, as well worthy of preservation : 66 THE DESERTED ISLE. I. "Like mournful echo from the silent tomb, That pines away upon the midnight air, Whilst the pale moon breaks out with fitful gloom; Fond memory turns with sad, but welcome care, To scenes of desolation and despairOnce bright with all that beauty could bestow, That peace could shed, or youthful fancy know. "My children, (oh, a mother's The wretches, vilest refuse of the earth, IX. "Sweet Isle! methinks I see thy bosom torn, That wrought destruction taste must ever Again behold the ruthless rabble throng, mourn. Alas! I see thee now,-shall see thee long; X. "Thy shores are warmed by bounteous suns in Columbia, if spite and envy spring The European stranger, who would fling |