And now he rises to what Lee called "menacing 'em with his resignation." He meekly yet adroitly masks a threat under a surprise that Congress has not asked for his resignation:

"In a word, the difficulties, which have for ever surrounded me since I have been in the service, and kept my mind constantly upon the stretch, the wounds, which my feelings as an officer have received by a thousand things, which have happened contrary to my expectation and wishes; the effect of my own conduct, and present appearance of things, so little pleasing to myself, as to render it a matter of no surprise to me if I should stand capitally censured by Congress; added to a consciousness of my inability to govern an army composed of such discordant parts, and under such a variety of intricate and perplexing circumstances;-induces not only a belief, but a thorough conviction in my mind, that it will be impossible, unless there is a thorough change in our military system, for me to conduct matters in such a manner as to give satisfaction to the public, which is all the recompense I aim at, or ever wished for."

Having compiled "in a word" this 165-word threat, he turned shy again, apologized "for the liberties taken in this letter, and for the blots and scratchings therein, not having time to give it more correctly.” 21

His letter threw Congress into a whirlpool of debate and certain steps were taken with the usual compromises between the mutually jealous colonies and their mutually jealous representatives. But things were not bettered, and instead of actions that would make possible a good army, Congress passed resolutions making good strategy impossible.

It was only to his few intimate friends and his relations at home that Washington let himself go. He could write to his brother the desolating story of the Kip's Bay disgrace and his present helplessness, and groan:

"Fifty thousand pounds should not induce me again to undergo what I have done." 22

He could cry out to his cousin Lund:

"If I were to wish the bitterest curse to an enemy on this side of the grave, I should put him in my stead with my feelings." 23

What must he not have written to Martha, who waited so eagerly for the good news that did not come?

The more one studies Washington's passionate life and tempestuous letters, the more amazing it is that he should have become a legend of marble serenity, of unmoved and undespairing confidence, the great "silent, unwavering" man of godlike calm.

His references to impending ruin are numberless. His language is as strong as the English vocabulary affords. According to the syntax of his time, his letters always have a certain formality when compared with the colloquialism at which present-day writing generally aims; but compared with most of the letters of his contemporaries, they are fervid to the point sometimes of frenzy, as when he describes to Lund the vanishing of his army almost as fast as he builds it:

"I discharged a regiment the other day that had in it fourteen rank and file for duty only, and several that had less than fifty. . . . I see the impossibility of serving with reputation, or doing any essential service to the cause by continuing in command, and yet I am told that if I quit the command inevitable ruin will follow from the distraction that will ensue.

"In confidence I tell you that I never was in such an unhappy, divided state since I was born."

He is haunted by the possibility of his death and asks to be justified in his grave for his inevitable failure:

"If I fall, it may not be amiss that these circumstances be known, and declaration made in credit to the justice of my character. And if the men will stand by me (which by the by I despair of), I am resolved not to be forced from this ground while I have life."

He turns again on the militia, that poor home-made sword of splintered lath that he was expected to fight all England with. Then, with an amazing abruptness, a surge of homesickness for his Mount Vernon softens his exhausted ire:

"With respect to the chimney, I would not have you for the sake of a little work spoil the look of the fireplaces, tho' that in the parlor must, I should think, stand as it does; not so much on account of the wainscotting, which I think must be altered (on account of the door leading into the new building,) as on account of the chimney piece and the manner of its fronting into the room."

He tells of "the chimney in the room above, and the chimney in the new room" which is to be "exactly in the middle of it-the doors and every thing else to be exactly answerable and uniform-in short I would have the whole executed in a masterly manner." He orders a window in the new cellar, and tells Lund:

"Let Mr. Herbert know that I shall be very happy in getting his brother exchanged as soon as possible, but as the enemy have more of our officers than we of theirs, and some of ours have been long confined (and claim ye right of being first exchanged,) I do not know how far it may be in my power at this time, to comply with his desires.

"Remember me to all our neighbors and friends, particularly to Colo. Mason, to whom I would write if I had time to do it fully and satisfactorily. Without this, I think the correspondence on my part would be unavailing

I am with truth and sincerity,

Dr Lund yr Affect'e friend."

A very human heart, that. Having relieved itself of his resentments; having cried out against his masters, the Congress; having abused his servants, the soldiers, he remembers pleasant homely things, and ends serenely with messages to the neighbors and apologies for not writing oftener.

Truly known, he is seen to be almost volatile in his quick recoveries from gloom at the first thrust of sunshine through

the clouds, and his prompt return to gloom when they close in again.

From a little before midnight of the 20th of September to the next noon, Washington and his army watched from Harlem Heights what promised to be the burning of New York that had been so much debated. General Greene seemed about to get his wish. The English had expected the attempt and told stories of New York rebels fighting New England and New Jersey rebels because the outsiders wanted to fire the town. It was said that the New York soldiers refused to march out until after the others were gone.

On the night of the Great Fire, the British stated that they caught a New England Captain with a match in his hand and more in his pocket and that he was "sacrificed on the spot to the fury of the soldiers.” 24

A Pennsylvania lieutenant met a similar fate. A letter of September 28, 1776, states:

'According to the report of a flag of truce who came to our lines soon after, those that were found in or near the spot were pitched into the conflagration, some hanged by the heels, others by their necks with their throats cut. Inhuman barbarity! One Hale in New York, on suspicion of being a spy, was taken up and dragged without ceremony to the execution post and hung up."

>> 25

Tench Tilghman wrote to his father that some of the rebels "were executed next day upon good grounds." Colonel Silliman wrote to his wife:

"I believe it was not the regulars, but some of our own people in the city that set it on fire, for they executed several of our friends there for it the next day."

26

Washington was accused of sending Nathan Hale and other spies into the town to destroy it, but there is no shred of evidence to prove it, and it is impossible to believe, since he had promised Congress that he would do all in his power

to prevent its destruction. Nearly five hundred houses were burned and nearly a quarter of the city destroyed before the flames were checked.

Nathan Hale was captured in New York on the day of the fire, and not previously on Long Island, as so often stated. He was executed on the 22nd of September at a spot in the neighborhood of what is now First avenue and Fifty-fifth street.27 He is one of the nation's sacred figures now, but his name rested in oblivion until it was rescued in 1799.

While Washington was the target of execration as a second Nero, he was also the butt of much more or less sprightly ridicule.

Soon after he lost Long Island and New York, he appeared as the unheroic hero of a farce called "The Battle of Brooklyn," published by the Tory printer, Rivington.28 This farce was a retort to the American play published at Philadelphia and called, "The Fall of British Tyranny." In that work the British leaders were caricatured as "Lord Mocklaw, Lord Hypocrite, Lord Religion, Judas Hutchinson, Admiral Tombstone," and the like, and the Americans were lauded as demigods of virtue.

The play included a generous tribute to the British dead at Bunker Hill. They were called "powdered beaux-fops -fribbles-skip jackets-jack puddings-noblemen's bastards and whores' sons."

The ending was an apotheosis of Washington and his generals, with a final allusion to Paine's "Common Sense," which by a noble effort was made to rhyme with "Independence."

The "Battle of Brooklyn" reversed the procedure with equal ribaldry. It has been called "unutterably coarse-a triumphant exhibition of vigor in the flinging back of filth at the enemy-in these respects, therefore, an authentic memorial of the very spirit and procedure of the time.” 29