The Enquirer

The Enquirer.

RICHMOND, SEPTEMBER 3, 1811.

"ANOTHER! AND YET ANOTHER!"

Day after day we see our vessels swept from us--& another link added to that chain of aggressions which we have received from G. Britain. When will this list end?--

"When will these Catalines cease to abuse our patience?"

Since our last, further ravages from the storm that desolates our coast, have reached us.

The Minerva, from Bordeaux for Baltimore, is swept into the fatal abyss. The Milo, belonging to Smith and Buchannan of Baltimore, bound from Bordeaux, has been seized off the Capes of Delaware in 13 fathoms water.--The Betsy, from R. Island bound to Sierra Leone, a British Settlement, has been swept into the jaws of Hell (Tartarus.) The storm too, begins to rage nearer and nearer to our own doors. The Orion from Petersburg, has just fallen a victim to the same Tartarus, bound as she was to a British island and laden with the produce of America. And what is still more galling to the Pride of an American, this very marauder now dares to violate our laws of interdiction by entering into Hampton roads. Where, we ask, are our frigates? Why is not the non intercourse law enforced to its utmost letter? Will not this insolent Briton be "required to depart" from the harbors and waters of the United States?

Whilst this storm rages upon our coast, our merchants should think of that resource, which the President, if he had the power would doubtless at this time extend to them.

They will, generally speaking, embargo their vessels; they must abandon the profits of the continental trade, for fear of British capture.

Let us see--How do we stand at this time? France has revoked her decrees as to ourselves--We have such proofs of this fact as ought to satisfy G. Britain. Her minister of foreign concerns has given such an official assurance of it to our own minister as G. B. herself has been accustomed to use in notifying her own blockades--And further--her minister has instructed the judge of the council of prizes, not to judge the American vessel according to the Principles of these decrees--What more does G. Britain ask? The French cruisers have not captured and carried into France, a single American vessel, bound from or to a British port, since the 1st of November.

The only one, which is said to have been seized under the decrees, in a French port, has been discharged--for the "N Orleans Packet" has actually been liberated by France (tho' probably at this moment a British prize !! )" and her bonds have been cancelled. In the mean time what is the conduct of G. B? Her Orders in Council are strictly executed--terms, which neither we nor she have a right to insist upon, are laid down as the conditions of their extinction--all our trade with her enemy cut up--not a cent's worth even of our native productions can be safely exported to them--and our Coasts blockaded by British frigates. And Sir J. Yorke is coming in the Vengeur (a prophetic name, say the British prints) with a fresh reinforcement of ships, and lots of charts of our coast, to drive the storm of piracy into our teeth The affair of the Little Belt must blow over, for Mr Foster is satisfied. G. B. will not go, formally, to war with us, But the wrongs and insults, which she will commit, will scarce leave us any other alternative than Force Such is the picture of British piracy and of our own situation! What shall we do in this extremity? It is for Congress to say; but should they feel the same spirit, which inspires the great mass of our citizens, they have but one honorable resource before them--Force.

The Expose of the situation of the French Empire was laid before the Legislative Body, on the 29th June--in this, the Orator declares, that England is placed between the ruin of her population, if she persists in maintaining the Spanish war, or shame if she abandon it after taking so conspicuous a part; that France has 800,000 men under arms, and when new armies shall have marched into Spain, she will still have 400,000 infantry and 50,000 cavalry on her soil to march to the defence of her rights, wheresoever threatened: that tho' the war may last yet a few more campaigns, Spain should be subdued, and the English driven from it--with the Continental system, if continued for 10 years, would alone be sufficient to destroy the resources of England;