“Ay,” assented McClave, “and, as befits my calling, properly combining them with religion.”

“How so?” demanded Brereton, taking his position before the fire.

“You see, man,” explained the presbyter, “it occurred to me that, on so wet a night, ’t would be almost impossible for the troops to keep their cartridges dry, since scarce a one in ten has a proper cartouch-box; so I set to making some new ones, and, having no paper, I’m e’en using the leaves of my own copy of Watts’ Hymns.”

“A good thought,” said Brereton; “and if you will give them to me I will see to it that they be kept dry and ready for use.  Not that they will need much care; there is small danger that Watts will ever be anything but dry.”

“Tut, tut, man,” reproved the clergyman.  “Dry or not dry, he has done God’s work in the past, and, with the aid of Heaven, he’ll do it again to-night.”

The rumble of artillery at this point warned the aide that the embarkation was actually beginning, and, hastily catching up the cartridges already made, he unbuttoned the flannel shirt he wore and stuffed them in.  Throwing his cloak about him, he hurried out.

The ice had finally been removed, and a hay barge dragged up to the pier.  Without delay two 12-pounders were rolled upon it, with their complement of men and horses; and, leaving further superintendence of the embarkation to Greene and Knox, Washington and his staff took their places between the guns.  Two row galleys having been made fast to the front, the men in them bent to their oars, and the barge moved slowly from the shore, its start being the signal to all the other craft to put off.

The instant the shelter of the land was lost, the struggle with the elements began.  The wind, blowing savagely from the northeast, swept upon them, and, churning the river into foam, drove the bitterly cold spray against man and beast.  Masses of ice, impelled by the current and blast, were only kept from colliding with the boat by the artillerymen, who, with the rammers and sponges of the guns, thrust them back, while the bowsmen in the tractive boats had much ado to keep a space clear for the oars to swing.  To make the stress the greater, before a fifty yards had been compassed the air was filled with snow, sweeping now one way and now another, quite shutting out all sight of the shores, and making the rushing current of the black, sullen river the sole means by which direction could be judged.

“Damn this weather!” swore Brereton, as an especially biting sweep of wind and water made him crouch the lower behind his shivering horse.

“Nothing short of that would serve to put warmth into it,” asserted Colonel Webb.  “You ’re not like to obtain your wish, Jack, though your cursing may put you where you’ll long for a touch of it.”

“Thou canst not fright me with threat of hell-fire damnation on such a night as this, Sam,” retorted Brereton.