with the actual idea of this
plan. Washington, Carleton, and every other leading man
on either side saw perfectly well that the British army
ought to cut the rebels in two by holding the direct line
from Montreal to New York throughout the coming campaign
of 1777. Given the irresistible British command of the
sea, fifty thousand troops were enough. The general idea
was that half of these should hold the four-hundred-mile
line of the Richelieu, Lake Champlain, and the Hudson,
while the other half seized strategic points elsewhere
and still further divided the American forces. But the
troops employed were ten thousand short of the proper
number. Many of them were foreign mercenaries. And the
generals were not the men to smash the enemy at all costs.
They were ready to do their duty. But their affinities
were rather with the opposition, which was against the
war, than with the government, which was for it. Howe
was a strong Whig. Burgoyne became a follower of Fox.
Clinton had many Whig connections. Cornwallis voted
against colonial taxation. To make matters worse, the
government itself wavered between out-and-out war and
some sort of compromise both with its political opponents
at home and its armed opponents in America.

Under these circumstances Carleton was in favour of a
modified plan. Ticonderoga had been abandoned by the
Americans and occupied by the British as Burgoyne marched
south. Carleton's idea was to use it as a base of operations
against New England, while Howe's main body struck at
the main body of the rebels and broke them up as much as
possible. Germain however, was all for the original plan.
So Burgoyne set off for the Hudson, expecting to get into
touch with Howe at Albany. But Germain, in his haste to
leave town for a holiday, forgot to sign Howe's orders
at the proper time; and afterwards forgot them altogether.
So Howe, pro-American in politics and temporizer in the
field, manoeuvred round his own headquarters at New York
until October, when he sailed south to Philadelphia.
Receiving no orders from Germain, and having no initiative
of his own, he had made no attempt to hold the line of
the Hudson all the way north to Albany, where he could
have met Burgoyne and completed the union of the forces
which would have cut the Colonies in two. Meanwhile
Burgoyne, ignorant of Germain's neglect and Howe's
futilities, was struggling to his fate at Saratoga, north
of Albany. He had been receiving constan