your services, and admires the principles upon which you act. Your countrymen in our army look up to you as their patron. The Count and his officers consider you as a man high in rank, and high in estimation here and also in France; and I, your friend, have no doubt but you will use your utmost endeavours to restore harmony, that the honor, glory, and mutual interest of the two nations may be promoted and cemented in the firmest manner."

To Count d'Estaing he wrote in language not less delicate and conciliatory, nor less fitted to remove unfavorable impressions.

In compliance with the order from the ministry given early in the season, Sir Henry Clinton detached five thousand men to the West Indies and three thousand to Florida; but there was much delay in fitting out these expeditions, and the troops did not actually sail till near the end of October. Lord Howe's fleet in the mean time had been reinforced by a squadron from Europe. As neither the orders nor the plans of the British general were known, it was conjectured that he might have in view a stroke upon Count d'Estaing's fleet in Boston harbour, and perhaps an attack upon that town. It is probable, also, that General Clinton gave a currency to rumors of this sort, for the purpose of diverting the attention of the Americans from his real objects. A report gained credit, believed to have come from good authority, that New York was to be evacuated. Washington suspected the true origin of this rumor, and could not persuade himself that an eastern expedition was intended; yet the public impression and the conviction of some of his officers were so strong, as to its reality, that he took measures to guard against it.

He established his head-quarters at Fredericksburg,

thirty miles from West Point near the borders of Connecticut, and sent forward a division under General Gates to Danbury. The roads were repaired as far as Hartford, to facilitate the march of the troops, and three brigades were despatched to that place. General Gates went to Boston, and took command of the eastern department, as successor to General Heath. These operations kept the army employed on the east side of the Hudson more than four months, till it was finally ascertained that the enemy had no designs in that direction.

Sir Henry Clinton took care to profit by this diversion of the American army. Foraging parties passed over to New Jersey, and ravaged the country. One of these parties attacked Baylor's dragoons in the night, at a short distance from Tappan, rushing upon them with the bayonet and committing indiscriminate slaughter. A similar assault was made upon Pulaski's legion at Egg Harbour. Both these adventures were attended with such acts of cruelty on the part of the enemy, as are seldom practised in civilized warfare. And they were not less impolitic than cruel, being regarded with universal indignation and horror by the people, and exciting a spirit of hatred and revenge, which would necessarily react in one form or another upon their foes. In fact this point of policy was strangely misunderstood by the British, or more strangely perverted, at every stage of the contest. They had many friends in the country, whom it was their interest to retain, and they professed a desire to conciliate others; yet they burned and destroyed towns, villages, and detached farmhouses, plundered the inhabitants without distinction, and brought down the savages with the tomahawk and scalping-knife upon the defenceless frontier settlements, marking their course in every direction with murder, 39

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desolation, and ruin. The ministry approved and encouraged these atrocities, flattering themselves that the people would sink under their sufferings, bewail their unhappy condition, become tired of the war, and compel their leaders to seek an accommodation. The effect

was directly the contrary in every instance. The people knew their rights, and had the common feelings of humanity; and, when the former were wantonly invaded and the latter outraged, it was natural that their passions should be inflamed, and that they who were at first pacifically inclined should be roused to resistance and retaliation. If the British cabinet had aimed to defeat its own objects, and to consolidate the American people into a united phalanx of opposition, it could not have chosen or pursued more effectual methods.

The campaign being closed, General Washington prepared to put the army into winter-quarters. Nine brigades were stationed on the west side of Hudson's River, exclusive of the garrison at West Point. One of these was near Smith's Clove, where it could serve as a reinforcement to West Point, should this be necessary; one at Elizabethtown; and the other seven at Middlebrook, which place was likewise selected for head-quarters. Six brigades were cantoned on the east side of the Hudson and at West Point, as follows; one at West Point, two at the Continental Village, a post between Fishkill and West Point, and three in the vicinity of Danbury in Connecticut. The artillery was at Pluckemin. A line of cantonments was thus formed around New York from Long Island Sound to the Delaware, so disposed as to afford security to the country, and to reinforce each other in case of an excursion of the enemy to any particular point. The other important objects intended by this disposition

were the comfort, discipline, and easy subsistence of the troops. General Putnam commanded at Danbury, and General McDougall in the Highlands. In the expectation that the British detachments, which sailed from New York, might act in the winter against South Carolina and Georgia, General Lincoln was sent by order of Congress to take the command of the southern department.

The four regiments of cavalry were widely separated; one being at Winchester in Virginia, another at Frederic in Maryland, a third at Lancaster in Pennsylvania, and a fourth at Durham in Connecticut. These cantonments were chosen apparently with a view to the convenience of procuring forage.

The exchange of prisoners continued to be a troublesome and perplexing subject. Arrangements had been made with Sir William Howe, before he left Philadelphia, by which exchanges to a certain extent had been effected. But new difficulties arose in regard to what were called the Convention Troops. Although Congress had ratified the convention of Saratoga, yet for various reasons they did not permit Burgoyne's army to embark for Europe according to the terms of that convention. Washington had no concern with this affair, except to execute the orders of Congress. These troops being thus retained in the country, it was finally agreed, on the part of the British commander, that they should be exchanged for American prisoners in his hands. But the conditions prescribed by Congress were such, that it was a long time before the object was attained. They proposed that officers of equal rank should first be exchanged; next, superior officers for an equivalent number of inferior; and if, after all the officers of the enemy should be exchanged, there should still be a surplus of American officers among the pris

oners, they were to be exchanged for an equivalent number of privates of the convention troops.

This principle was objected to by Sir Henry Clinton on two grounds; first, it separated the officers from the corps to which they were attached; and, secondly, it gave an advantage to the Americans, inasmuch as their officers could go immediately into active service, whereas the British officers must remain idle till the privates constituting the corps to which they belonged should be released. Congress did not choose to relax from their resolves, and the business of exchange was a perpetual source of vexation. In short, the interests of the two parties were so much at variance, that it was not easy to reconcile them. The difficulty of procuring soldiers in Europe, and the great expense of bringing them over and maintaining them, rendered every man of vastly more importance to the British army, than in the American ranks, which could be filled up with militia when the occasion required. Hence the British general was always extremely solicitous to procure the exchange of his private soldiers, and Congress equally averse to gratifying him in this point. There was another reason, which operated with considerable weight on both sides. The British prisoners were mostly German troops, who had no affection for the cause in which they were engaged, and who, while in the country under a loose system of military discipline, had many facilities and temptations to desert.

There was another cause of anxiety in the breast of Washington, which began now to be felt more seriously than at any former period of the war. The men of talents and influence, who had taken the lead and combined their strength in raising the standard of independence, had gradually withdrawn from Congress, till that body was left small in number, and compara