Hamilton brought the troops, and returned the order with seal intact.

The act of his sudden breaking with Washington has been much exaggerated.  In fact, it was not a sudden act at all, for it had been premeditated for some months.  There was a woman in the case.  Hamilton had done more than conquer General Gates on that Northern trip; at Albany, he had met Elizabeth, daughter of General Schuyler, and won her after what has been spoken of as “a short and sharp skirmish.”  Both Alexander and Elizabeth regarded “a clerkship” as quite too limited a career for one so gifted; they felt that nothing less than commander of a division would answer.  How to break loose—­that was the question.

And when Washington met him at the head of the stairs of the New Windsor Hotel and sharply chided him for being late, the young man embraced the opportunity and said, “Sir, since you think I have been remiss, we part.”

It was the act of a boy; and the figure of this boy, five feet five inches high, weight one hundred twenty, aged twenty-four, talking back to his chief, six feet three, weight two hundred, aged fifty, has its comic side.  Military rule demands that every one shall be on time, and Washington’s rebuke was proper and right.  Further than this, one feels that if he had followed up his rebuke by boxing the young man’s ears for “sassing back,” he would still not have been outside the lines of duty.

But an hour afterwards we find Washington sending for the youth and endeavoring to mend the break.  And although Hamilton proudly repelled his advances, Washington forgave all and generously did all he could to advance the young man’s interests.  Washington’s magnanimity was absolutely without flaw, but his attitude towards Hamilton has a more suggestive meaning when we consider that it was a testimonial of the high estimate he placed on Hamilton’s ability.

At Yorktown, Washington gave Hamilton the perilous privilege of leading the assault.  Hamilton did his work well, rushing with fiery impetuosity upon the fort—­carried all before him, and in ten minutes had planted the Stars and Stripes on the ramparts of the enemy.

It was a fine and fitting close to his glorious military career.

* * * * *

When Washington became President, the most important office to be filled was that of manager of the exchequer.  In fact, all there was of it was the office—­there was no treasury, no mint, no fixed revenue, no credit; but there were debts—­foreign and domestic—­and clamoring creditors by the thousand.  The debts consisted of what was then the vast sum of eighty million dollars.  The treasury was empty.  Washington had many advisers who argued that the Nation could never live under such a weight of debt—­the only way was flatly and frankly to repudiate—­wipe the slate clean—­and begin afresh.