CHAPTER V. THE LOSS OF PHILADELPHIA

Though the outlook for Washington was brightened by his success
in New Jersey, it was still depressing enough. The British had
taken New York, they could probably take Philadelphia when they
liked, and no place near the seacoast was safe. According to the
votes in Parliament, by the spring of 1777 Britain was to have an
army of eighty-nine thousand men, of whom fifty-seven thousand
were intended for colonial garrisons and for the prosecution of
the war in America. These numbers were in fact never reached, but
the army of forty thousand in America was formidable compared
with Washington's forces. The British were not hampered by the
practice of enlisting men for only a few months, which marred so
much of Washington's effort. Above all they had money and
adequate resources. In a word they had the things which
Washington lacked during almost the whole of the war.

Washington called his success in the attack at Trenton a lucky
stroke. It was luck which had far-reaching consequences. Howe had
the fixed idea that to follow the capture of New York by that of
Philadelphia, the most populous city in America, and the seat of
Congress, would mean great glory for himself and a crushing blow
to the American cause. If to this could be added, as he intended,
the occupation of the whole valley of the Hudson, the year 1777
might well see the end of the war. An acute sense of the value of
time is vital in war. Promptness, the quick surprise of the
enemy, was perhaps the chief military virtue of Washington;
dilatoriness was the destructive vice of Howe. He had so little
contempt for his foe that he practised a blighting caution. On
April 12, 1777, Washington, in view of his own depleted force, in