said:  “If the enemy have it in their power to press us hard this campaign, I know not what may be the consequence.”  He had faced the enemy, the bleak winters, raw soldiers, and all the difficulties of impecunious government, with a cheerful courage that never failed.  But the spectacle of widespread popular demoralization, of selfish scrambles for plunder, and of feeble administration at the centre of government weighed upon him heavily.  It was not the general’s business to build up Congress and grapple with finance, but Washington addressed himself to the new task with his usual persistent courage.  It was slow and painful work.  He seemed to make no progress, and then it was that his spirits sank at the prospect of ruin and defeat, not coming on the field of battle, but from our own vices and our own lack of energy and wisdom.  Yet his work told in the end, as it always did.  His vast and steadily growing influence made itself felt even through the dense troubles of the uneasy times.  Congress turned with energy to Europe for fresh loans.  Lafayette worked away to get an army sent over.  The two Morrises, stimulated by Washington, flung themselves into the financial difficulties, and feeble but distinct efforts toward a more concentrated and better organized administration of public affairs were made both in the States and the confederation.

But, although Washington’s spirits fell, and his anxieties became wellnigh intolerable in this period of reaction which followed the French alliance, he made no public show of it, but carried on his own work with the army and in the field as usual, contending with all the difficulties, new and old, as calmly and efficiently as ever.  After Clinton slipped away from Monmouth and sought refuge in New York, Washington took post at convenient points and watched the movements of the enemy.  In this way the summer passed.  As always, Washington’s first object was to guard the Hudson, and while he held this vital point firmly, he waited, ready to strike elsewhere if necessary.  It looked for a time as if the British intended to descend on Boston, seize the town, and destroy the French fleet, which had gone there to refit.  Such was the opinion of Gates, then commanding in that department, and as Washington inclined to the same belief, the fear of this event gave him many anxious moments.  He even moved his troops so as to be in readiness to march eastward at short notice; but he gradually became convinced that the enemy had no such plan.  Much of his thought, now and always, was given to efforts to divine the intentions of the British generals.  They had so few settled ideas, and were so tardy and lingering when they had plans, that it is small wonder that their opponents were sorely puzzled in trying to find out what their purposes were, when they really had none.  The fact was that Washington saw their military opportunities with the eye of a great soldier, and so much better than they, that he suffered a good deal of needless anxiety in devising methods to meet attacks which they had not the wit to undertake.  He had a profound contempt for their policy of holding towns, and believing that they must see the utter futility of it, after several years of trial, he constantly expected from them a well-planned and extensive campaign, which in reality they were incapable of devising.