Of the small portions of this Navy engaged in actual service during the
peace, squadrons have continued to be maintained in the Pacific Ocean,
in the West India seas, and in the Mediterranean, to which has been
added a small armament to cruise on the eastern coast of South America.
In all they have afforded protection to our commerce, have contributed
to make our country advantageously known to foreign nations, have
honorably employed multitudes of our seamen in the service of their
country, and have inured numbers of youths of the rising generation to
lives of manly hardihood and of nautical experience and skill. The
piracies with which the West India seas were for several years infested
have been totally suppressed, but in the Mediterranean they have
increased in a manner afflictive to other nations, and but for the
continued presence of our squadron would probably have been distressing
to our own. The war which has unfortunately broken out between the
Republic of Buenos Ayres and the Brazilian Government has given rise to
very great irregularities among the naval officers of the latter, by
whom principles in relation to blockades and to neutral navigation have
been brought forward to which we can not subscribe and which our own
commanders have found it necessary to resist.
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