attacks; but he now recovered his presence of mind, and saw his course plain before him. Having withdrawn the Rall and Von Lossberg regiments to the open ground east of the village, he ordered them to face about, and advance in extended line against what had now become the American position. Their ranks were re-formed; their colours were displayed conspicuously in the centre of each battalion; and the band struck up a tune. The moment had arrived for trying the efficacy of that assault with the bayonet which was the gallant veteran's ideal of warfare. It was all in vain. His own regiment would not face the rifles. The Von Lossbergs, who alone of the Hessians on that day did well, or even respectably, lost several officers and thirty men, without anywhere getting into thrusting distance of an enemy. Rall fell from his horse with two frightful wounds; and his troops abandoned the fray, and retired to an apple-orchard just beyond the Friends' Meeting House on the eastern edge of the village. The surviving field-officers recognised that all was over. Their men would not go forward; and the means for standing successfully on the defensive were altogether wanting. Wet had spoiled the muskets; and towards the close of the affair there were a great many more misfires than explosions. The braver soldiers were seen chipping away at their flints amid a shower of bullets, and then pulling their triggers again and again without effect. Artillery, in those days, was the proper weapon for bad weather; but the German cannon had all been captured or disabled. Washington, on the other hand, had provided himself with fieldpieces in double the ordinary proportion to the numbers of his infantry; and he had committed them to the charge of an officer who utilised them to the very utmost. Colonel Knox, who had thriven in business by industry and assiduity, laid claim to no other qualities in his capacity of an artilleryman;1 and he took good

1 "Will it give you satisfaction or pleasure in being informed that the Congress have created me a general officer, with the entire command

care at Trenton that no man in his command should be idle, and no gun-muzzle silent, as long as any profitable work remained to be executed.

Knox hurried up his batteries from the point where they had been stationed at the commencement of the action, and cannonaded the Hessians, who shielded themselves, as best they could, among the trees of the orchard. Greene had kept in reserve two entire brigades, posted on his extreme left, in express view of some such contingency as now occurred; and they moved forward in serried ranks, with loaded arms, eager to take their part in the victory. The Germans saw themselves threatened by a semicircle of field-guns; while a thousand fresh and untouched troops of the Continental line were bearing down upon them within a distance of sixty paces. The American infantry forbore from shooting, and the artillery-fire ceased; for both parties knew that the fight was ended, and neither of them desired that the butchery should begin. The Hessian standards were lowered; the muskets were grounded; "and the officers placed their hats on the points of their swords, and held them up in token of submission."1 Some few hundred yards away to the southward the Von Knyphausen regiment was helplessly recoiling from the conflict in quest of safety. Major von Dechow, mortally hurt, had fallen into American hands; and his senior captain attempted to escape, with the remnant of his command, by the bridge over the Assunpink Creek. If the roads which led to the ferries had been properly patrolled by cavalry, the whole garrison, forewarned in time, might have made good their retreat across that bridge long before Washington had arrived within several miles of the town. It was now too late; for Sullivan, who never in his life made a finer figure than on that morning, had already secured the

of the artillery? If so, I shall be happy. People are more lavish in their praises of my poor endeavours than they deserve. All the merit I can claim is industry." General Knox to his wife; January 2, 1777. 1 Stryker's Trenton and Princeton.

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pass with infantry and cannon. Two field-pieces, which the Von Knyphausens dragged along with them, sank in the mud, and were abandoned to the advancing enemy. The march of the column was obstructed by a train of waggons, piled up with plunder, which had been brought thus far, but no further, on the way to Germany; and a throng of camp-followers, male and female, shrieking, and rushing to and fro as the shot flew about them, spread panic and disorder in the ranks. Under cover of the thick underbrush that fringed the stream some captains and lieutenants, with a few hardy privates, endeavoured to discover a passage through the creek; sounding the bottom with their spontoons, and wading up to their necks in the ice-cold water. The stoutest fellows swam across to freedom; but others were drowned; and Sullivan's leading brigade, active in pursuit, was now almost within pistol-shot. The Germans were called upon to surrender at discretion; and, after a protracted parley, they consented to obey. As the Hessian regiment threw down their firelocks, "the patriot troops tossed their hats in the air; a great shout resounded through the village, and the battle of Trenton was closed." 1

Rall's forces, when the affair commenced, had been sixteen hundred strong.2 Their killed and wounded

1 Stryker's Trenton and Princeton.

Colonel Knox gave his wife an excellent account of the affair in brief, interspersed with touches of affection not out of place even in such a story. "About half a mile from the town," he wrote, 66 was an advanced guard on each road, consisting of a captain's guard. These we forced, and entered the town with them pell-mell; and here succeeded a scene of war of which I had often conceived, but never saw before. The hurry, fright, and confusion of the enemy was not unlike that which will be when the last trump shall sound. They endeavoured to form in the streets, the head of which we had previously the possession of with cannon and howitzers. These, in the twinkling of an eye, cleared the streets. The backs of the houses were resorted to for shelter. These proved ineffectual. The musketry soon dislodged them. Finally they were driven through the town into the open plains beyond."

2 Each of the three line regiments contained on an average four hundred and eighty men and officers; and there were, in addition, the Chasseurs, the detachment of artillery, and some British dragoons.

were above a hundred, of whom two-thirds belonged to the Von Lossberg regiment. The Americans captured six field-pieces; a thousand fine muskets; forty sound horses; fifteen standards; twelve brass-barrel drums, and all the clarionets and hautboys, together with forty hogsheads of rum. Among the prisoners were thirty regimental officers, ninety-two Sergeants, twenty-nine musicians, and seven hundred and forty privates; as well as a Provost Marshal, whose office must of late have been a sinecure, for the buildings occupied by the Germans contained a large assortment of miscellaneous property which had not been honestly come by. Washington gave directions that the casks of rum should at once be staved in, and the liquor emptied on the ground; and he invited the inhabitants of New Jersey to reclaim any goods of which they had been despoiled. Those farmers from Hopewell Township, who had come to his assistance empty-handed, might now carry back with them their fireplaces and kitchen-furniture to help their wives and children through what remained of the sav age winter. The Hessians, in their hour of humiliation, made a resplendent show. Their regimental flags were of white silk, worked in gold with haughty devices to which the occasion lent an ironical meaning.' The soldiers were described by an eye-witness as heartylooking and well-clad, with large knapsacks, and spatterdashes on their legs. The Rall battalion in dark blue, the Von Lossbergs in scarlet, the Von Knyphausens in neat and seemly black, and the artillerymen in blue coats with crimson lapels and white borders, were all in singular contrast to the dingy threadbare summer clothing, and naked feet, of their captors.

1 The Von Lossberg banner bore the words "Pro Principe et Patriâ ; " and some Americans knew enough Latin to wonder what were the patriotic interests which had brought Hessians to fight on the Delaware. Another regiment, which had shown no appetite for battle, displayed a Lion rampant, surmounted by the motto "Nescit Pericula." The captured standards are reported as fifteen in General von Heister's official despatch to the Prince of Hesse. The general probably included the guidons of companies as well as the regimental flags.

Washington gathered up his prizes; collected his troops; and issued orders to start forthwith upon the homeward journey. Before his departure, accompanied by General Greene, he waited upon Colonel Rall; took his parole of honour, which was a sad and very superfluous ceremony; spoke to him kindly and most respectfully; and assured him, in reply to his anxious request, that the prisoners should be humanely and considerately treated. Rall did not survive the morrow; and Von Dechow died within a few hours of his chief. Washington's troops reached the ferry, where they had left their vessels, in time to commence the return passage over the Delaware before nightfall. The weather had not mended. A boatful of German officers came very near being swamped in the freezing current; and tradition relates that three Americans died outright of cold. The victors arrived at their respective quarters dropping with sleep,1 having marched and fought continuously for six-and-thirty, forty, and in some cases for fifty, hours. That was a long and a severe ordeal; and yet it may be doubted whether so small a number of men ever employed so short a space of time with greater and more lasting results upon the history of the world.

One circumstance in the affair was strange almost to

1 The good people of the house, in which a young New England captain lodged, had prepared for him a large dish of hasty pudding; but he fell asleep over his supper, and awoke next morning with the spoon still in his hand.

David How was at Trenton; and his journal represents that famous passage of arms under its most elementary aspects.

"Dec. 24. We have ben Drawing Cateridges And provisions in order for a Scout.

"25. This Day at 12 a Clock we Marched Down the River about 12 miles. In the Night we Crossed the River Dullerway With a large Body of men And Field Pieces.

"26. This morning at 4 a Clock we set off with our Field pieces and Marched 8 miles to Trenton whare we ware Atacked by a Number of Hushing and we Toock 1000 of them besides killed Some. Then we marched back and got to the River at Night and got over all the Hushing.

"27. This morning we Crossed the River and come to our Camp at Noon.

"28. This Day we have ben washing Our things."

PT. II.-VOL. II.

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