storehouses filled with munitions and supplies of various kinds, both for the naval forces on the lakes and for the armies designed for the long projected invasion of Canada likewise, stood back of the wharves crowded with the miscellaneous shipping of the suddenly thriving little town. Soldiers from the fort, therefore, in blue and gray uniforms mingled with the ship-carpenters, wood-cutters, pioneers, sailors, and traders, and the spot speedily became one of the busiest in the then far Northwest. 

 Sometimes in the offing the white sails of the English or American squadrons could be seen, and on the summer days from the distant horizon might have been heard the dull boom of cannon telling a tale of some spirited engagement. And more than once thereafter a melancholy and shattered ship brought in a ghastly cargo of dead, dying, and wounded, the care of which heavily taxed the resources of the community; and the women of the village—for there were women there from the beginning—had grim lessons, learned sometimes through breaking hearts, that war was a more serious business than the gay officers, the bright uniforms, the beautiful flags, and the brave ships had indicated. 

 The town had sprung into being around Sewell's store and tavern, amid all these activities and undertakings, almost as if by magic—quite as the great ship had risen on the shore, in truth. Men did things in a hurry in those days, and no one was much surprised when, some thirty days after the keel was laid, the indefatigable Eckford informed stout old Commodore Chauncey, the American commander on the lakes, that the Susquehanna—for so the ship-of-the-line which was to establish finally the American preponderance of force over the British on Lake Ontario was called—was ready for launching, and great preparations were made in the very early spring of 1815 for this important and interesting ceremony. 

 A few days before the appointed time, however, there came to the impatient commodore, the persevering builder, and the busy workmen a messenger bearing a heartrending despatch, long delayed in transmission, from the Secretary of the Navy. That official announced that the war was over, that peace with England had been declared at the close of the preceding year, and directed that the preparations for launching and completing the vessel must be at once abandoned. It was a sore grief to Eckford and his fellow-shipwrights, a great disappointment to Chauncey and his brave seamen, and a terrible blow to the thriving town. It had grown and flourished in war, and it was to languish and die in peace—a reversal of natural law apparently! But there was no 

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