with the statement already made.  The actual force of the American army at Brooklyn was not far from nine thousand men, instead of twenty thousand, and the effective force (New York included) was only about twenty thousand men.  As the British regiments brought but six, instead of eight, companies to a battalion, there is evidence that Washington himself occasionally over-estimated the British force proper; but the foreign battalions realized their full force, and they were paid accordingly, upon their muster rolls.  Nearly three fifths of General Howe’s army was made up from continental mercenaries.  These troops arrived in detachments, to supplement the army which otherwise would have been entirely unequal to the conquest of New York, if the city were fairly defended.

If, on the other hand, Washington had secured the force which he demanded from Congress, namely, fifty-eight thousand men, which was, indeed (but too tardily), authorized, he could have met General Howe upon terms of numerical equality, backed by breast-works, and have held New York with an equal force.

This estimate, by Washington himself, of the contingencies of the campaign, will have the greater significance when reference is made to the details of British preparations in England.

While Congress did, indeed, as early as June, assign thirteen thousand additional troops for the defence of New York, the peremptory detachment of ten battalions to Canada, in addition to previous details, persistently foiled every preparation to meet Howe with an adequate force.  Regiments from Connecticut and from other colonies reported with a strength of only three hundred and sixty men.  While the “paper strength” of the army was far beyond its effective force, even the “paper strength” was but one half of the force which the Commander-in-chief had the right to assume as at his disposal.

Other facts fall in line just here.

At no later period of the war did either commander have under his immediate control so large a nominal force as then.  During but one year of the succeeding struggle did the entire British army, from Halifax to the West Indies inclusive (including foreign and provincial auxiliaries), exceed, by more than seven thousand men, the force which occupied both sides of the New York Narrows in 1776.  The British Army at that time, without its foreign contingent, would have been as inferior to the force which had been ordered by Congress (and should have been available) as the depleted American army of 1781 would have been inferior to the British without the French contingent.

The largest continental force under arms, in any one year of the war, did not greatly exceed forty thousand men, and the largest British force, as late as 1781, including all arrivals, numbered, all told, but forty-two thousand and seventy-five men.

The annual British average, including provincials, ranged from thirty-three to thirty-eight thousand men.  The physical agencies which Great Britain employed were;, therefore, far beneath the prestige of her accredited position among the nations; and the disparity between the contending forces was mainly in discipline and equipment, with the advantage to Great Britain in naval strength, until that was supplanted by that of France.