"  Why,"  said  they,  "  was  the  enemy  allowed  to  leave
their  shipping  and  enter  Philadelphia  without  being  at-
tacked and  harassed  on  their  march  ?  Why  was  their  left
wing  left  unwatched  at  the  battle  of  Chad's  Ford  ?  These
are  very  discouraging  things,  and  ought  to  be  rigorously
inquired  into. The  proper  method  of  attacking,  beating,
and  conquering  the  enemy,  has  never  yet  been  adopted
by  the  Commander-in-chief. The  many  fruitless  and  un-
accountable marches  have  a  great  tendency  to  fill  the  hos-
pitals with  sick,  and  more  men  will  die  this  winter  than  it
would  have  cost  lives  to  conquer  the  enemy  last  summer
and  fall. Raiment,  contrary  to  the  good  old  maxim,  has
been  regarded  more  than  life,  and  the  baggage  many
times  sent  away  to  the  great  hurt  of  the  army. There
was  something  very  mysterious  in  the  sending  of  generals
from  head-quarters  to  order  the  erasure  and  evacuation  of
Red  Bank ;  if  they  were  only  fit  to  judge  they  ought  to


1777.]  LIFE   OF   NATHANAEL    GREENE. 3

have  been  sent  six  weeks  earlier,  and  if  the  forts  were  not
sufficient,  to  have  given  orders  and  directions  to  have  them
made  so ;  for  if  the  forts  had  been  properly  supphed,  the
shipping  could  not  have  come  up,  and  without  a  free  pas-
sage fqr  their  shipping,  the  enemy  could  not  have  held  the
city. Then  these  generals  who  were  sent  merely  to  judge
could  not  have  known  that  Greene  was  advancing  to  sup-
port the  forts  ;  and  when  members  of  the  same  body  act,
not  in  conjunction  but  in  opposition  to  each  other,  it  ar-
gues great  weakness  in  the  head. If  the  enemy  come  out
to  forage,  as  they  necessarily  must,  they  ought  to  be  at-
tacked at  all  events,  and  if  there  is  no  general  fit  and  wil-
ling to  lead  them  on,  the  supreme  power,  the  Congress,
that  is,  ought  to  send  one. It  is  a  very  great  reproach  to
America  to  say  there  is  only  one  general  in  it ;  the  great
succe'ss  to  the  northward  was  owing  to  a  change  of  com-
manders  ;  and  the  southern  army  would  have  been  alike
successful  if  a  similar  change  had  taken  place. 