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CHAP. were already on their march to join Cornwallis; the seventeenth with three companies of horse, under Mawhood, was more than a mile in advance of the fifty-fifth, and had already passed Stony brook. On discovering in his rear a small body of Americans, apparently not larger than his own, he recrossed the rivulet, and forming a junction with a part of the fifty-fifth and other detachments on their march, hazarded an engagement with Mercer. The parties were nearly equal in numbers; each had two pieces of artillery; but the English were fresh, while the Americans were weary from hunger and cold, the fatigues of the preceding day, their long night-march of eighteen miles, and the want of sleep. Both parties rushed toward the high ground that lay north of them, on the right of the Americans. A heavy discharge from the English artillery was returned by Neal from the American field-pieces. After a short but brisk cannonade, the Americans, climbing over a fence to confront the British, were the first to use their guns; Mawhood's infantry returned the volley, and soon charged with their bayonets; the Amer icans, for the most part riflemen without bayonets, gave way, abandoning their cannon. Their gallant officers, loath to fly, were left in their rear, endeavoring to call back the fugitives. In this way fell Haslet, the brave colonel of the Delaware regiment; Neal, who had charge of the artillery; Fleming, the gallant leader of all that was left of the first Virginia regiment; and other officers of promise; Mercer himself, whose horse had been disabled under him, was wounded, knocked down, and

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then stabbed many times with the bayonet. Just CHAP. then, Washington, who had turned at the sound of the cannon, came upon the ground by a movement which intercepted the main body of the British fifty-fifth regiment. The Pennsylvania militia, supported by two pieces of artillery, were the first to form their line. "With admirable coolness and address," Mawhood attempted to carry their battery; the way-worn novices began to waver; on the instant, Washington, from "his desire to animate his troops by example," rode into the very front of danger, and when within less than thirty yards of the British, he reined in his horse with its head towards them, as both parties were about to fire; seeming to tell his faltering forces that they must stand firm, or leave him to confront the enemy alone. The two sides gave a volley at the same moment; when the smoke cleared away, it was thought a miracle that Washington was untouched. By this time Hitchcock, for whom a raging hectic made this day nearly his last, came up with his brigade; and Hand's riflemen began to turn the left of the English; these, after repeated exertions of the greatest courage and discipline, retreated before they were wholly surrounded, and fled over fields and fences up Stony brook. The action, from the first conflict with Mercer, did not last more than twenty minutes. Washington on the battle-ground took Hitchcock by the hand, and, before his army, thanked him for his service.

Mawhood left on the ground two brass fieldpieces, which, from want of horses, the Americans could not carry off. He was chased three or four

CHAP. miles, and many of his men were taken prisoners; XIV. the rest joined Leslie when his brigade came up

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from Maidenhead.

While the larger part of the army was engaged with the troops under Mawhood, the New England regiments of Stark, Poor, Patterson, Reed, and others, drove back the fifty-fifth, which, after a gallant resistance and some loss, retreated with the fortieth to the college. Pieces of artillery were brought up to play upon them; but to escape certain capture they fled in disorder across the fields into a back road towards Brunswick. Had there been cavalry to pursue, they might nearly all have been taken.

The British lost on that day about two hundred killed and wounded, and two hundred and thirty prisoners, of whom fourteen were British officers. The American loss was small, except of officers; but Mercer, who was mortally wounded, stood in merit next to Greene, and by his education, abilities, willing disposition, and love for his adopted country, was fitted for high trusts.

At Trenton, on the return of day, the generals were astonished at not seeing the American army; and the noise of the cannon at Princeton first revealed whither it was gone. In consternation for the safety of the magazines at Brunswick, Cornwallis roused his army, and began a swift pursuit. His advanced party from Maidenhead reached Princeton, just as the town was left by the American rear. It had been a part of Washington's original plan to seize Brunswick, which was eighteen miles distant; but many of his brave soldiers, such

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is the concurrent testimony of English and German CHAP. officers as well as of Washington, were "quite barefoot, and were badly clad in other respects;' Jan. all were exhausted by the unabated service and fatigue of two days and a night, from action to action, without shelter, and almost without refreshment; and the British were close upon their rear. So with the advice of his officers, after breaking up the bridge at Kingston over the Millstone river, Washington turned towards the highlands, and halted for the night at Somerset court-house. There, in the woods, worn-out men sank down on the bare, frozen ground, and fell asleep without regard to the cold; an easy prey, had Cornwallis had the spirit to pursue them.

The example and the orders of Washington roused the people around him to arms, and struck terror into all detached parties of the British. On the fifth, the day of his arrival at Morristown, a party of Waldeckers, attacked at Springfield by an equal number of the New Jersey militia under Oliver Spencer, were put to flight with a loss of forty-eight, of whom thirty-nine were left as prisoners. In the afternoon of the same day, as George Clinton with troops from Peekskill was approaching Hackensack, the British force withdrew from the place, saving their baggage by a timely flight. Newark was abandoned; Elizabethtown was surprised by General Maxwell, who took much baggage and a hundred prisoners.

The eighteenth, which was the king's birthday, was chosen for investing Sir William Howe with the order of the Bath. The ceremony was shorn

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CHAP. of its glory, for it was a mockery to call him XIV. now a victorious general; and both he and the Jan. secretary of state already had a foresight of future 18. failure, for which each of them was preparing to throw the blame on the other. In the midst of the rejoicings, news came that Heath had brought down a party of four thousand New York and New England militia to the neighborhood of Kingsbridge, and with foolish bombast had summoned Fort Independence. The British laughed at his idle and farcical threats, which he made no attempt to fulfil; his coming did not even disturb the fireworks and the feast in the city; and he soon afterwards made a hasty and timid retreat before the shadow of danger. He, as indeed more than half the American major-generals, was thought unworthy of his high command.

20.

But in New Jersey, all continued to go well. On the twentieth, General Philemon Dickinson, with about four hundred raw troops, forded the Millstone river, near Somerset court-house, and defeated a foraging party, taking a few prisoners, forty wagons, and sheep and cattle, and upwards of a hundred horses of the English draught breed. New Jersey was nearly free; the British held only Brunswick and Amboy and Paulus-hook. Washington made his head-quarters at Morristown; and in that town and the surrounding villages, his troops found shelter; the largest encampment was in Spring valley on the southern slope of Madison hill; his outposts extended to within three miles of Amboy; and weak as was his army, the woods, the hills, and the rivers formed a barrier against