n the letters from headquarters. Anxiety and strain
of nerve are apparent; but a resolute determination rises over all,
supported by a ready fertility of resource. Couriers flew over the
country asking for powder in every town and in every village. A vessel
was even dispatched to the Bermudas to seize there a supply of powder,
of which the general, always listening, had heard. Thus the immediate
and grinding pressure was presently relieved, but the staple of war
still remained pitifully and perilously meagre all through the winter.

Meantime, while thus overwhelmed with the cares immediately about him,
Washington was watching the rest of the country. He had a keen eye
upon Johnson and his Indians in the valley of the Mohawk; he followed
sharply every movement of Tryon and the Tories in New York; he refused
with stern good sense to detach troops to Connecticut and Long Island,
knowing well when to give and when to say No, a difficult monosyllable
for the new general of freshly revolted colonies. But if he would not
detach in one place, he was ready enough to do so in another. He sent
one expedition by Lake Champlain, under Montgomery, to Montreal, and
gave Arnold picked troops to march through the wilds of Maine and
strike Quebec. The scheme was bold and brilliant, both in conception
and in execution, and came very near severing Canada forever from the
British crown. A chapter of little accidents, each one of which proved
as fatal as it was unavoidable, a moment's delay on the Plains of
Abraham, and the whole campaign failed; but there was a grasp of
conditions, a clearness of perception, and a comprehensiveness about
the plan, which stamp it as the work of a great soldier, who saw
besides the military importance, the enormous political value held out
by the chance of such a victory.

The daring, far-reaching quality of this Canadian expedition was much
more congenial to Washington's temper and character than the wearing
work of the siege. All that man could do before Boston was done, and
still Congress expected the impossible, and grumbled because without
ships he did not secure the harbor. He himself, while he inwardly
resented such criticism, chafed under the monotonous drudgery of the
intrenchments. He was longing, according to his nature, to fight, and
was, it must be confessed, quite ready to attempt the impossible in
his own way. Early in September he proposed to attack the town in
boats and by the neck of land a