y,
in the course of which he visited Philadelphia. On arriving there he
was taken with chills, followed by a fever, which went on increasing
in violence, and terminated fatally. A soldier even unto the end,
warlike scenes mingled with the delirium of his malady. In his dying
moments he fancied himself on the field of battle. The last words he
was heard to utter were, "Stand by me, my brave grenadiers!"

CHAPTER LI.
ARRIVAL OF A FRENCH FLEET.--MASSACRE AT WYOMING VALLEY.--CAPTURE OF
SAVANNAH.

While encamped at Paramus, Washington, in the night of the 13th of
July, received a letter from Congress informing him of the arrival of
a French fleet on the coast; instructing him to concert measures with
the commander, the Count D'Estaing, for offensive operations by sea
and land, and empowering him to call on the States from New Hampshire
to New Jersey inclusive, to aid with their militia. The fleet in
question was composed of twelve ships of the line and six frigates,
with a land force of four thousand men. On board of it came Mons.
Gerard, minister from France to the United States, and the Hon. Silas
Deane, one of the American ministers who had effected the late treaty
of alliance. The fleet had sailed from Toulon on the 13th of April.
After struggling against adverse winds for eighty-seven or
eighty-eight days, it had made its appearance off the northern
extremity of the Virginia coast, and anchored at the mouth of the
Delaware on the 8th of July.

Finding the enemy had evacuated both city and river, the count sent up
the French minister and Mr. Deane to Philadelphia in a frigate, and
then, putting to sea, continued along the coast. A little earlier, and
he might have intercepted the squadron of Lord Howe on its way to New
York. It had had but a very few days the advantage of him, and when he
arrived with his fleet in the road outside of Sandy Hook, he descried
the British ships quietly anchored inside of it.

A frank and cordial correspondence took place forthwith between the
count and Washington, and a plan of action was concerted between them
by the intervention of confidential officers; Washington's
aides-de-camp, Laurens and Hamilton, boarding the fleet while off the
Hook, and Major Chouin, a French officer of merit, repairing to the
American head-quarters.

The first idea of the count was to enter at Sandy Hook, and capture or
destroy the British fleet, composed of six ships of the line, four
fifty-gun