plained to Congress of his reception at camp, Washington
wrote the president that he was not given to dissimulation, and that
he certainly had been cold in his manner. He wrote to Lafayette that
slander had been busy, and that he had urged his officers to be
cool and dispassionate as to Conway, adding, "I have no doubt that
everything happens for the best, that we shall triumph over all our
misfortunes, and in the end be happy; when, my dear Marquis, if you
will give me your company in Virginia, we will laugh at our past
difficulties and the folly of others." But though he wrote thus
lightly to his friends, he followed Gates sternly enough, and kept
that gentleman occupied as he drove him from point to point. Among
other things he touched upon Conway's character with sharp irony,
saying, "It is, however, greatly to be lamented that this adept in
military science did not employ his abilities in the progress of the
campaign, in pointing out those wise measures which were calculated to
give us 'that degree of success we could reasonably expect.'"

Poor Gates did not find these letters pleasant reading, and one more
curt note, on February 24, finished the controversy. By that time the
cabal was falling to pieces, and in a little while was dispersed.
Wilkinson's resignation was accepted, Mifflin was put under
Washington's orders, and Gates was sent to his command in the north.
Conway resigned one day in a pet, and found his resignation accepted
and his power gone with unpleasant suddenness. He then got into a
quarrel with General Cadwalader on account of his attacks on the
commander-in-chief. The quarrel ended in a duel. Conway was badly
wounded, and thinking himself dying, wrote a contrite note of apology
to Washington, then recovered, left the country, and disappeared from
the ken of history. Thus domestic malice and the "bitter party" in
Congress failed and perished. They had dashed themselves in vain
against the strong man who held firmly both soldiers and people.
"While the public are satisfied with my endeavors, I mean not to
shrink from the cause." So Washington wrote to Gordon as the cabal
was coming to an end, and in that spirit he crushed silently and
thoroughly the faction that sought to thwart his purpose, and drive
him from office by sneers, slights, and intrigues.

These attacks upon him came at the darkest moment of his military
career. Defeated at Brandywine and Germantown, he had been forced from
the forts