impossible, thing for them to return.

"'Besides,' he wrote on the 21st, 'Washington's men have neither shoes
nor stockings nor blankets, are almost naked, and dying of cold and want
of food.'"

"And didn't Rall say the Americans wouldn't dare to come against him?"
asked Walter.

"Yes; his reply to a warning of danger of being attacked was, 'Let them
come; what need of intrenchments! We will at them with the bayonet!'"

"And when they did come he was killed?"

"Yes, mortally wounded; taken by his aids and servant to his quarters
at the house of a Quaker named Stacey Potts; and there Washington and
Greene visited him just before leaving Trenton."

"They knew he was dying, mamma?"

"Yes, and, as Lossing tells us, Washington offered such consolation as a
soldier and Christian can bestow."

"It was very kind, and I hope Rall appreciated it."

"It would seem that he did, as the historian tells us it soothed the
agonies of the expiring hero."