it fell, and shoot the bird's head off.
He was given command of a corps of picked riflemen; and in the Battle of
the Brandywine in 1777 he rendered services which won acclaim from the
whole army. For the honor of that day's service to his King, Ferguson
paid what from him, with his passion for the rifle, must have been
the dearest price that could have been demanded. His right arm was
shattered, and for the remaining three years of his short life it hung
useless at his side. Yet he took up swordplay and attained a remarkable
degree of skill as a left-handed swordsman.

Such was Ferguson, the soldier. What of the man? For he has been
pictured as a wolf and a fiend and a coward by early chroniclers, who
evidently felt that they were adding to the virtue of those who fought
in defense of liberty by representing all their foes as personally
odious. We can read his quality of manhood in a few lines of the letter
he sent to his kinsman, the noted Dr. Adam Ferguson, about an incident
that occurred at Chads Ford. As he was lying with his men in the woods,
in front of Knyphausen's army, so he relates, he saw two American
officers ride out. He describes their dress minutely. One was in hussar
uniform. The other was in a dark green and blue uniform with a high
cocked hat and was mounted on a bay horse:

"I ordered three good shots to steal near to and fire at them; but the
idea disgusting me, I recalled the order. The hussar in retiring made a
circuit, but the other passed within a hundred yards of us, upon which
I advanced from the wood towards him. Upon my calling he stopped; but
after looking at me he proceeded. I again drew his attention and made
signs to him to stop; levelling my piece at him; but he slowly cantered
away. As I was within that distance, at which, in the quickest firing,
I could have lodged half a dozen balls in or about him before he was out
of my reach, I had only to determine. But it was not pleasant to fire
at the back of an unoffending individual who was acquitting himself
very coolly of his duty--so I let him alone. The day after, I had been
telling this story to some wounded officers, who lay in the same room
with me, when one of the surgeons who had been dressing the wounded
rebel officers came in and told us that they had been informing him that
General Washington was all the morning with the light troops, and only
attended by a French officer in hussar dress, he himself dressed and
mounted in every