no attention,
although the orders were repeated almost every day for a month. He
lingered, and loitered, and excused himself, and at last was taken
prisoner. This disposed of him for a time very satisfactorily, but
meanwhile he had succeeded in keeping his troops from Washington,
which was a most serious misfortune.

On December 2 Washington was at Princeton with three thousand ragged
men, and the British close upon his heels. They had him now surely
in their grip. There could be no mistake this time, and there was
therefore no need of a forced march. But they had not yet learned that
to Washington even hours meant much, and when, after duly resting,
they reached the Delaware, they found the Americans on the other side,
and all the boats destroyed for a distance of seventy miles.

It was winter now, the short gray days had come, and with them
piercing cold and storms of sleet and ice. It seemed as if the
elements alone would finally disperse the feeble body of men still
gathered about the commander-in-chief. Congress had sent him blank
commissions and orders to recruit, which were well meant, but were not
practically of much value. As Glendower could call spirits from the
vasty deep, so they, with like success, sought to call soldiers from
the earth in the midst of defeat, and in the teeth of a North American
winter. Washington, baffling pursuit and flying from town to town,
left nothing undone. North and south went letters and appeals for men,
money, and supplies. Vain, very vain, it all was, for the most part,
but still it was done in a tenacious spirit. Lee would not come, the
Jersey militia would not turn out, thousands began to accept Howe's
amnesty, and signs of wavering were apparent in some of the Middle
States. Philadelphia was threatened, Newport was in the hands of the
enemy, and for ninety miles Washington had retreated, evading ruin
again and again only by the width of a river. Congress voted not
to leave Philadelphia,--a fact which their General declined to
publish,--and then fled.

No one remained to face the grim realities of the time but Washington,
and he met them unmoved. Not a moment passed that he did not seek in
some way to effect something. Not an hour went by that he did not turn
calmly from fresh and ever renewed disappointment to work and action.

By the middle of December Howe felt satisfied that the American army
would soon dissolve, and leaving strong detachments in various posts
he wit