[Illustration: HEAVING THE LEAD ON BOARD THE FRIGATE.]
Meantime the frigate, seeing what was going on, endeavored to help her consort; but the shoal lay between, and it took her a long time to round its lower end. Barney, knowing that he could not sustain a fight with her, decided to make off, and did not stand upon the order of his going. Hastily throwing a prize crew on board the "Monk," he held his course up the river; while the frigate, which had turned back, was seen in the distance doubling the southern end of the shoal. But she was too late, and the "Hyder Ali" arrived with her convoy at Philadelphia, bringing with her as a trophy the sloop which had been captured with so much skill and gallantry.
The engagement between the "Hyder Ali" and the "General Monk" was the last of any importance during the war. Indeed, since the beginning of the French alliance in 1778, hostilities on the American coast had been chiefly carried on by the great English and French fleets of line-of-battle ships, which cast into the shade the small operations of the Continental Navy. In this very month Sir George Rodney won his great victory over the Count de Grasse in the West Indies,--a battle between two opposing fleets larger than had ever before been brought into action. Early in the next year the Treaty of Paris was concluded, which recognized the independence of the United States; and the navy and the army were disbanded, the ships that remained were sold, and the officers and men returned again to private life.
Just at the close of the Revolution the country found itself independent, but laboring under a heavy burden of debt, and with a government that had hardly enough authority to be called a government at all. In fact, at this period the nation was little more than a collection of separate States, with a kind of league or confederation to hold them together. Each of these States had its own government, which paid little attention to the wants of the others. After a few years, however, it became clear that the jealousies and rivalries of the States would break up the league unless they were held together by some stronger bond; and as they could attain strength and greatness only by union, they wisely laid aside all their little differences, and acting through their delegates at Philadelphia, formed that wonderful plan of a united nation called the Constitution, which went into force in 1789, and under which we still live; for so skilfully was it framed, that it has stood every shock and trial, and the time will soon arrive to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of its adoption.