ence, but
showed in his reply that he was but half soothed. "At this very
critical juncture," writes he, October 16, "I shall continue to act
some time longer, but Congress must prepare to put the care of this
department into other hands." He had remained at his post, therefore,
discharging the various duties of his department with his usual zeal
and activity; and Gates, at the end of the campaign, had repaired, as
we have shown, to the vicinity of Congress to attend the fluctuation
of events.

Circumstances in the course of the winter had put the worthy Schuyler
again on points of punctilio with Congress. Among some letters
intercepted by the enemy and retaken by the Americans was one from
Colonel Joseph Trumbull, the commissary-general, insinuating that
General Schuyler had secreted or suppressed a commission sent for his
brother, Colonel John Trumbull, as deputy adjutant-general. The
purport of the letter was reported to Schuyler. He spurned at the
insinuation. "If it be true that he has asserted such a thing," writes
he to the president, "I shall expect from Congress that justice which
is due to me.... Until Mr. Trumbull and I are upon a footing, I cannot
do what the laws of honor and a regard to my own reputation render
indispensably necessary. Congress can put us on a par by dismissing
one or the other from the service."

Congress failed to comply with the general's request. They added also
to his chagrin by dismissing from the service an army physician in
whose appointment he had particularly interested himself. Schuyler was
a proud-spirited man, and at times somewhat irascible. In a letter to
Congress, on the 8th of February, he observed: "As Dr. Stringer had my
recommendation to the office he has sustained, perhaps it was a
compliment due to me that I should have been advised of the reason of
his dismission." And again: "I was in hopes some notice would have
been taken of the odious suspicion contained in Mr. Commissary
Trumbull's intercepted letter. I really feel myself deeply chagrined
on the occasion. I am incapable of the meanness he suspects me of, and
I confidently expected that Congress would have done me that justice
which it was in their power to give, and which I humbly conceive they
ought to have done." This letter gave great umbrage to Congress, but
no immediate answer was made to it.

About this time the office of adjutant-general, which had remained
vacant ever since the resignation of Colonel