o hiring foreign troops was so intense, that, for many
weeks, there was no practical advance in preparations for a really
effective blow at the rebels, while the rebellion itself was daily
gaining head and spirit.

The British army, just before the battle of Long Island, including
Hessians, Brunswickers, and Waldeckers, was but a little larger than
that which the American Congress, as early as October 4, 1775, had
officially assigned to the siege operations before Boston. That force
was fixed at twenty-three thousand, three hundred and seventy-two men.
General Howe landed about twenty thousand men. With the sick, the
reserves on Staten Island, all officers and supernumeraries included,
his entire force exhibited a paper strength of thirty-one thousand, six
hundred and twenty-five men. It is true that General Howe claimed, after
the battle of Long Island, that his entire force (Hessians included) was
only twenty four thousand men, and that Washington opposed the advance
of his division with twenty thousand men. The British muster rolls, as
exhibited before the British Parliament, accord with the statement
already made. The actual force of the American army at Brooklyn was not
far from nine thousand men, instead of twenty thousand, and the
effective force (New York included) was only about twenty thousand men.
As the British regiments brought but six, instead of eight, companies to
a battalion, there is evidence that Washington himself occasionally
over-estimated the British force proper; but the foreign battalions
realized their full force, and they were paid accordingly, upon their
muster rolls. Nearly three fifths of General Howe's army was made up
from continental mercenaries. These troops arrived in detachments, to
supplement the army which otherwise would have been entirely unequal to
the conquest of New York, if the city were fairly defended.

If, on the other hand, Washington had secured the force which he
demanded from Congress, namely, fifty-eight thousand men, which was,
indeed (but too tardily), authorized, he could have met General Howe
upon terms of numerical equality, backed by breast-works, and have held
New York with an equal force.

This estimate, by Washington himself, of the contingencies of the
campaign, will have the greater significance when reference is made to
the details of British preparations in England.

While Congress did, indeed, as early as June, assign thirteen thousand
additional troo