o winter
quarters at Valley Forge, not far from the city; while Howe besieged
and on November 2 took the American forts on the Delaware. The British
campaign was successful; Philadelphia was theirs, and they had won
every engagement. But nothing shows more clearly Washington's ability
as a fighter and leader than his stubborn contest against odds in this
summer.

Meanwhile, the Northern campaign came to its conclusion. By September,
Gates, the new commander, found himself at the head of nearly 20,000
men, and Burgoyne's case grew desperate. He made two efforts to break
through to the southward, at Freeman's Farm, and again at Bemis
Heights, but was {92} met by superior numbers and overwhelmed, in spite
of the gallantry of his troops. Forced back to Saratoga on the Hudson
River, he was surrounded and at length compelled to surrender, on
October 17. Sir Henry Clinton, who commanded the British garrison of
New York in Howe's absence, sent a small expedition up the Hudson; but
it did not penetrate nearer than sixty miles from the spot where
Burgoyne stood at bay, and it achieved nothing more than a raid. So
the northern British force, sent to perform an impossible task, was
destroyed solely because neither Howe nor his superiors realized the
necessity of providing for certain co-operation from the southward.
The prisoners, according to the terms of the surrender, were to be
returned to England; but Congress, owing in part to some complaints of
Burgoyne, chose to violate the agreement, and the captive British and
Hessians were retained. Burgoyne himself returned to England, burning
with anger against Howe and the North Ministry.

The winter of 1777-8 found the two British armies comfortably housed in
New York and Philadelphia, and Washington, with his handful of
miserably equipped men, presenting the skeleton of an army at Valley
Forge. Congress, now manned by less able leaders than at first, was
almost won over to {93} displacing the unsuccessful commander by Gates,
the victor of Saratoga; and it did go so far as to commit the
administration of the army to a cabal of Gates's friends, who carried
on a campaign of depreciation and backbiting against Washington. But
the whole unworthy plot broke down under a few vigorous words from the
latter, the would-be rival quailing before the Virginian's personal
authority. He was not a safe man to bait. The military headship
remained securely with the one general capable o