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Burgoyne had surrendered, they retreated, setting fire to CHAP every house within reach. This was about the very time that Burgoyne and his army were receiving liberal terms 1777. of capitulation.

General Gates, in transmitting his report of the surrender, did not send it to the Commander-in-chief, as was his duty, and as courtesy required, but sent it directly to Congress. The soldiers in the army attributed the success of the battles at Saratoga to the skilful management of Arnold and Morgan. Gates did not even mention their names in his full dispatches to Congress.

Soon after, General Schuyler insisted that his management of the Northern Department, previous to the appointment of Gates, should be investigated.

A Court of Inquiry was instituted, and he was not only acquitted of the charge of mismanagement of any kind, but with the highest honor. Though strongly urged by Congress to remain in the army, he declined. He had too much self-respect to continue in a position where he could be made a victim of unfriendly prejudice, yet too patriotic to relinquish his country's cause. Soon after he took his seat as a member of Congress.

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CHAPTER XXXIV.

WAR OF THE REVOLUTION-CONTINUED.

Sufferings at Valley Forge.-England disappointed; conciliatory measures of Parliament.-The War presses hard upon the American People.Difficulties and Jealousies in Congress.-The "Conway Cabal."-Baron Steuben.-Attempt to increase the Army.-Congress in Want of Funds. Exchange of Lee; his Treason.-Treaty with France.-Encouragements.-British Commissioners.-Philadelphia evacuated.-Battle of Monmouth.-Misconduct of Lee.-The French Fleet.-Combined attack upon Newport fails.-Marauding Expeditions.-A British Fleet.Massacre at Wyoming and Cherry Valley.-Invasion of Georgia.

CHAP. THE surrender of Burgoyne revived the hopes of the Whigs, and sent dismay into the ranks of the Tories. 1778. The American soldiers suffered intensely in their rude huts at Valley Forge. For days at a time without meat, and again without bread; no medicines for the sick, nor comfortable lodgings. Many of the soldiers were so deficient in clothes that they could not lie down, lest they should freeze to death, but were forced to sit round their camp-fires.

These were the men, few of whose names have ever reached us, but who clung to their country's cause in this hour of suffering, and who, in the day of battle, poured out their life's blood. They were, for the most part, the intelligent yeomanry of the land; from the farm, from the workshop, from the merchant's store; supporters of their own families, or sustainers of orphan brothers and sisters. What a contrast with the common soldiers of the invading

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army! They were, in part, the enlisted rabble of the CHAP British Isles. In their bosoms there was not a throb of generous feeling, nor with them was it a question in what 1778 cause, or on what field they fought; and yet in the same army were others, even more degraded, drawn from "the shambles of petty German despots."

The king and ministry were sanguine their plans, so wisely laid, would be successfully carried out; that at the end of the campaign the American army would be broken and scattered; that they would have a line of posts extending from Lake Champlain to the Bay of New York. Instead of the realization of these hopes, intelligence came that Burgoyne had surrendered his entire army. The sensation produced in England was great indeed. Rumors stole into the country, that France, their ancient enemy, was about to aid the Americans; that Holland was about to loan them money. England's pride was touched. Should she, who had made all Europe tremble, be baffled in her efforts to subdue her revolted colonists? A new spirit was awakened; many of the large commercial towns offered to raise regiments to supply the places of those surrendered at Saratoga, and present them to the king. Yet there were others, moved by compassion, and it may be by sympathy for the cause, who liberally subscribed money to relieve the wants of the American prisoners in England, whom the government had left to suffer for the necessaries of life.

These sentiments had their effect on Parliament, and when it assembled, the friends of America renewed their assaults upon the policy of the king. They, from the first, had opposed the war as unjust, and had opposed the enlisting of Hessians; but more especially did they denounce the inhuman policy of employing savages to murder and scalp their brethren beyond the Atlantic. There were other causes of complaint. The merchants clamored for

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CHAP. redress; the American trade was broken up; debts could not be collected; especially were they aggrieved that 1778. the slave-trade had been reduced four-fifths. American cruisers had already seized nearly six hundred of their vessels. These cruisers swarmed to such an extent, even in the British seas, that it became necessary to convoy by armed ships merchant vessels from one port of the kingdom to another. More than twenty thousand men had perished in the war; more than a hundred millions of dollars had been expended; their expectations had been greatly raised, but as yet nothing was gained.

Lord North was constrained to bring in two bills, by which the king hoped to reconcile his American subjects. On this occasion, the former declared in the House that he himself had always been opposed to taxing the colonies. The king, in truth, was the prime mover and sustainer of the measure. One of these bills exempted the Americans from taxation, the other appointed commissioners to negotiate with them, for the purpose of restoring the royal authority. Thus was yielded, but ungraciously, the whole ground of the contest.

The moment the French government heard of the passage of these bills, it proposed to acknowledge the Independence of the United States, and to make with them a treaty offensive and defensive. That the belligerents should fight and weaken each other, France was willing, but rather than they should become reconciled, she declared for the Americans.

Though the war had cost England much, it had cost the Americans more. In many portions of the country, their ruthless invaders had laid waste their cultivated fields; in other portions they were unsown, because the husbandmen were in the army; property was wasting away; debts were accumulating, with no prospect of payment. The bills of credit issued by Congress were almost

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worthless. As with individuals, so with the State; both CHAP. were bankrupt. On the sea-board, foreign commerce, the coasting trade, and the fisheries, were carried on at such 1778. risks, as to be almost annihilated. Nine hundred vessels had fallen into the hands of the enemy. The loss of life had been great; not so many had perished on the field of battle, but disease, the deficiency of necessary comforts in hospitals, the want of clothes and of wholesome food, had as effectively done the work of death. Multitudes died miserably, either in the jails and loathsome prison-ships of the enemy, or contracted diseases which clung to them through life. These calamities, instead of depressing the patriots, roused their indignant spirits to more determination. They would listen to no terms of reconciliation with England, short of absolute independence.

That no

Congress was embarrassed more and more. ble spirit of conciliation and mutual forbearance, which distinguished the members of the Old Congress, was not so prominent. Many of the ablest members had retired to take part in the recently organized governments of their own States, or to attend to their private affairs, lest their families should come to want; and some had been sent on foreign missions, and some were in the army.

There were other difficulties; jealousies between northern and southern men still existed in the army, and jealousies between American officers and some of those of foreign birth. Congress, now numbering not more than twenty or thirty members, manifested an undue prejudice against the army, because the officers and soldiers earnestly urged that their wants should be supplied. Washington protested against this spirit, and showed the unreasonableness of such a prejudice. After remarking that in other countries the army was looked upon with suspicion in time of peace, he adds: "It is our policy to be prejudiced against them (the troops) in time of war; though they