the diary of David How, which, in addition to
revealing his actions, gives a glimpse of the camp at the end of the
year, when many of the men were going away, and the others were joining
their new regiments.

"This Day," writes How on the 30th of December, "we paraded and had our
guns took from us By the Major to prise them.

"31. This Day we have been In an uprore about packun our Things up In
order to go home a Monday morning as Soon as we Can.

"Jan 1. We have ben all Day a pecking up our Things For to go home.

"2d we all Left Cambridg this morning I went to mr. Granger and staid
all night.

"3d I went to methuen.

"5d I went to Haver hill to by some Leather for Bretches.

"6 day I come to Andover and Staid at Mr. osgoods.

"7 day I come to Cambridge about Six a Clock at Night.

"Jany the 8 1776 This Day I Began with Mr. Watson....

"Jan 14.[141] This Day I wint to Cobble Hill & to Litchmor point and to
prospeck hill & So Home again. Nothing new.

"22. I listed with Leut David Chandler in Coln Sergant Regment."

And so David How, veteran of Bunker Hill, and doubtless many other young
men, found the lure of the camp, and let us say the chance to serve the
country, too much to withstand. Freedom to earn their own wages, and to
stroll about the fortifications on Sundays, were not to be measured
against the romance of soldiering and the hope of battle.

This same New Year's Day, 1776, occurred an event of importance in the
hoisting of the flag with the thirteen stripes. Previously the colonies
had used different devices, in the South a rattlesnake flag with the
motto, "Don't tread on me," and for the Connecticut troops the colony
arms and the motto _Qui transtulit sustinet_, "which we construe thus:
'God, who transplanted us hither, will support us.'"[142] Massachusetts
had used the pinetree flag and the motto "Appeal to Heaven," and the
little navy had a sign by which its ships were known to each other, "the
ensign up to the main topping-lift." Now for the first time the thirteen
stripes with the British crosses in the corner were raised, amid much
enthusiasm.

Curiously, this coincided with the coming of the king's recent speech in
Parliament, and a strange interpretation was put upon the appearance of
the new flag. The British had caused to be sent to the American lines
many copies of the speech, expecting that its expression of the king's
determination to prosecute the war, even by the use of foreign