generals, requested their opinions in writing. Before these were given
in, word was brought that the enemy had actually evacuated the city.

Sir Henry had taken his measures with great secrecy and despatch. The
army commenced moving at three o'clock on the morning of the 18th,
retiring to a point of land below the town formed by the confluence of
the Delaware and Schuylkill, and crossing the former river in boats.
By ten o'clock in the morning the rear-guard landed on the Jersey
shore.

On the first intelligence of this movement, Washington detached
General Maxwell with his brigade, to co-operate with General Dickinson
and the New Jersey militia in harassing the enemy on their march. He
sent General Arnold, also, with a force to take command of
Philadelphia, that officer being not yet sufficiently recovered from
his wound for field service; then, breaking up his camp at Valley
Forge, he pushed forward with his main force in pursuit of the enemy.
As the route of the latter lay along the eastern bank of the Delaware
as high as Trenton, Washington was obliged to make a considerable
circuit, so as to cross the river higher up at Coryell's Ferry, near
the place where, eighteen months previously, he had crossed to attack
the Hessians.

Heavy rains and sultry summer heat retarded his movements; but the
army crossed on the 24th. The British were now at Moorestown and Mount
Holly. Thence they might take the road on the left for Brunswick, and
so on to Staten Island and New York; or the road to the right through
Monmouth, by the Heights of Middletown to Sandy Hook. Uncertain which
they might adopt, Washington detached Colonel Morgan with six hundred
picked men to reinforce Maxwell, and hang on their rear; while he
himself pushed forward with the main body toward Princeton, cautiously
keeping along the mountainous country to the left of the most northern
road.

The march of Sir Henry was very slow. From his dilatory movements,
Washington suspected Sir Henry of a design to draw him down into the
level country, and then, by a rapid movement on his right, to gain
possession of the strong ground above him, and bring him to a general
action on disadvantageous terms. He himself was inclined for a general
action whenever it could be made on suitable ground: he halted,
therefore, at Hopewell, about five miles from Princeton, and held
another council of war. The result of it, writes his aide-de-camp,
Colonel Hamilton, "would have done