e hills in the interior. There was a good
deal of severe fighting after this, and Fort Washington, which had been
gallantly defended by a brave American officer, Colonel Magan, was
captured by us, with its garrison of upwards of two thousand men.

We spent some time in the camp talking to various acquaintances among
the soldier officers whom we met, and as we wandered on we came to a
spot where a drum-head court-martial was sitting. They were trying a
man who had been accused of being a spy, captured endeavouring to make
his way out of the camp at night. He had just been pronounced guilty.
He stood with his arms bound and soldiers holding him on either side.
He was a fine tall young man with an intelligent countenance, and though
dressed in the hunter's garb of a backwoodsman, torn and travel-stained,
and covered with dirt, while his appearance was as rough as he could
make it, I thought as I looked at him that he was above the rank he had
assumed. A few short moments only were allowed him from the time of his
condemnation till his execution. His guilt was clear; he did not even
attempt to defend himself. The president had just finished addressing
him as we came up.

"If it is a crime to love one's country better than anything else on
earth, to exert every faculty of mind and body, to sacrifice one's time
and property, to risk liberty and life to serve her, then I am guilty--
to love liberty and freedom of conscience, to hate tyranny and
oppression, then I am indeed a criminal," he answered in an unshaken
voice. "You call me a spy and load me with opprobrium. It was
necessary to gain information as to the movements of your mercenary
army: twice have I obtained that information and carried it to our noble
general. My only regret is that I have not succeeded a third time in so
doing; but understand that though I have thus laboured to injure you
secretly, I have ever fought openly against you on the field of battle,
and on that account I might plead to die a soldier's death, and not to
be treated as a dog and hung. Yet it matters little. According to your
laws my sentence is just. I seek not to appeal from it, and I die with
the joyous certainty that the righteous cause for which I suffer will
triumph at last, and that your proud legions will retire from this
country defeated and disgraced."

"Silence, young man?" exclaimed the president; "you departed from your
allegiance to your lawful sovereign; you acknow