hend the greatest obstacles to the successful prosecution of the war and the ultimate union of the United States. and monopolists hoarded the very necessaries of life. Trade with the royal troops was opened on every side. Though the maga zines at Valley Forge were empty, and meat was often not seen 1 De moral ize, to corrupt the morals of. 2 Con trǎct'or, one who contracts or engages to perform any work or service, at a certain price or rate, for the public, for a company of any kind, or for a single person. 3 Mo nop'o list, one who pur chases the whole of any article in market for the sake of selling at an advanced price; or one who has a privilege, granted by authority, for the sole buying or selling of any commodity. for a week at a time, the markets in Philadelphia were abundantly supplied. 5. Washington, having received authority from Congress to seize provisions for the troops and issue scrip1 therefor, ordered the farmers within a radius 2 of seventy miles to thresh out onehälf of their grain by February first, and the rest by March first, under penalty of having it all seized as straw. The inhabitants refused, and, guns in hand, stood guard over their stacks and cattle, even burning what they could not sell, to prevent its falling into the hands of the famishing patriot army. Men abandoned useful occupations to plunge into gambling and other disreputable pursuits; counterfeited the public securities; forged official signatures; refused to pay their honest debts except in depreciated paper-money; and fattened upon the common necessities. Washington, alarmed at this enemy in the rear-this new peril that threatened the country-wrote that "idleness, dissipation, and extravagance seem to have laid fast hold of most; speculation, peculation, and an insatiate thirst for riches have got the better of every other consideration and almost every order of men." 3 4 6. At first the masses were enthusiastic; but as the contest wore on, the slow friction of the struggle became irksome, and, in many quarters, apathy was almost universal. During the flight across New Jersey, not one hundred volunteers from that State rallied under the flag of their only defender. The Maryland militia, sent to Washington's aid just before the battle of Germantown,5 lost half its number by desertion. When Pennsylvania was overrun by the British, and the Federal capital in 1 Scrip, certificates acknowledging a loan and promising repayment. 2 Ra'di us, a straight line extending from the centre of a circle to its circumference; a radius of seventy miles would include all those living within seventy miles in every direction. 3 Spěc'u la'tion, buying land or goods for the purpose of holding them until they have advanced in price. This practice differs from regular trade, in which the profit expected is the difference between 5 Ger'man town, a town a few miles north of Philadelphia, where a battle was fought on October 4, 1777, in which the Americans under Generals Wayne and Sullivan were defeated. the hands of the enemy, there were only twelve hundred Pennsylvania militia in the army. 7. Recruiting was slow; very few enlistments were secured for three years, or during the war. Sabine says "that the price paid for a single recruit was sometimes as high as one thousand dollars, besides the bounty offered by Congress; and that one hundred and fifty dollars in specie1 was given for only five months service." The soldier might be pardoned for deserting the cause of a country that would neither pay him nor feed him; but what should be thought of a people that, before the war, could import one and a hälf million dollars worth of tea annually, besides other luxuries, and yet allow the men who were fighting for its liberties to starve and freeze in this hour of peril ? 3 8. Even in the army which was engaged in protecting the dearest rights of man, all were not patriots nor honest men. Whigs were plundered under the pretence of being tories. Parties of a dozen or twenty men at a time returned home, or took refuge in the newer settlements of the country. Some escaped from the ranks and joined the royalist regiments, and became spies, guides, and informers. Bounty-jumpers 4 infested the ranks. Drunkenness and theft were by no means uncommon. A foreigner of rank dying at Washington's quarters, and being buried with his jewels and costly clothing, a guard was placed over his grave to prevent the soldiers from digging up his body for plunder. 9. Nor were the officers always better than their men. There were those who used for their own gratification, money designed to pay the troops under their command: who violated their furloughs and grossly neglected their duty. Courtsmartial were frequent, and long lists of the cashiered were 5 1 Specie (spe'shy), hard money, or coin. 2 Whig, a friend and supporter of the American side in the war of the Revolution. 3Tō'ry, an American colonist who, in the time of the Revolution, took the side of England against the colonies. 4 Boun'ty - jump'er, one who en 6 lists for the sake of the bounty offered in time of war, and then deserts, in order to re-enlist and secure a second bounty. 5 Furlough, permission given by a commanding officer to an officer or soldier to be absent from service for a certain time. 6 Cash iēred', dismissed from of fice or service. from time to time forwarded to Congress. Washington declared that the officers sent him from one State were "not fit to be shoe-blacks," and wrote to a certain governor that the officers from his State were "generally from the lowest class, and led their men into every kind of mischief." Many of the surgeons, too, he complained, were rascals, receiving bribes to grant discharges, and applying to their private use the luxuries designed for the sick. There were constant feuds among the officers for rank and position. 10. Members of Congress lost heart. Many of the strong men stayed at home, and weaklings took their place. For some time only twenty-one members were present. A bitter opposition to Washington was developed, and while the demands upon him as commander-in-chief were as exacting as ever, his recommendations and well-known opinions were openly thwarted or quietly passed over. 1 Arnold was the oldest brigadier-general, and, in the opinion of Washington, there was "no more active, spirited, or sensible officer;" yet he was passed over in promotion. Stark, than whom none was braver, was also slighted, and he retired to his plow, and remained at home, until he came to Bennington 2 to show how a victory could be won with raw militia. Gates was appointed adjutant-general without consulting Washington as to whom he desired for chief of his staff. 11. The commissary department was re-organized against Washington's expressed wishes. Colonel Trumbull, an efficient commissary-general, at once resigned. 3 Henceforth the bad working of that department caused continual delays and dişăsters. Mifflin, the quartermaster-general, was disgracefully 1 Benedict Arnold, an officer in the American Revolutionary army, born in Norwich, Conn., Jan. 3, 1740; died in London, June 14, 1801. He entered into treasonable correspondence with Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander in New York, with the intention of delivering West Point into his hands. The plan was defeated, and Arnold entered the British service, with a commission as major-general. 2 Ben' ning ton, a town in the 4 southern part of Vermont, where a brigade of New Hampshire militia under General Stark defeated eight hundred Hessians, Canadians, and Indians, August 16, 1777. 3 Com'mis sa ry - ġen'e ral, the head of the commissary department, or department of an army for supplying provisions, etc. 4 Quar'ter mas ter-ġen'e ral, the chief of the department for providing quarters, clothing, fuel, etc., for an army. unmindful of his duties. Washington could never get a stock of provisions on hand for any movement that he contemplated. Indeed, it is said that during the dreary march to Valley Forge, when the shivering troops left lines of red behind them from their bruised and bleeding feet, "hogsheads of shoes, stockings, and clothing were lying at different places on the roads and in the woods, perishing for want of teams, or of money to pay the teamsters." II. 104. WHAT THE MONKS HAVE DONE. T was a monk-Roger Bacon-who first discovered and exmonk-Schwartz of Cologne-to invent gunpowder; and which, more fully developed some centuries afterward by the great Catholic philosopher, Gălileo, enabled him to invent the microscope and the telescope. It was a monk-Salvino of Pisa-who, in the twelfth century, invented spectacles for the old and the short-sighted. To the monks-Pacifico of Verona, the great Gerbert, and William, abbot of Hirschau-we owe the invention of clocks, between the tenth and the twelfth centuries. 2. It was the monks who, in the middle ages, taught the people agriculture, and who, by their skilful in'dustry, reclaimed whole tracts of waste land. It was the monks who first cultivated botany, and made known the hidden medicinal properties of plants. It is to the monks that we are in all probability indebted for the paper on which we write. It was the monk Gerbert who first introduced into Europe the arithmetical numbers of the Arʼabs (A.D. 991), and who thus laid the foundation of arithmetical and mathematical studies. 3. It was an Italian priest-Gälvänï-who first discovered the laws of the subtile fluid called after him. It was a Spanish Benedictine monk-Pedro da Ponce-who (A.D. 1570) first taught Europe the art of instructing the deaf and dumb. It was a French Catholic priest-the Abbé Haüy—who, in a work published toward the close of the last century, first unfolded the principles of the modern science of mineralogy. |