never be able, or would never dare, to retaliate. Hence their prisoners
were most infamously treated. Against this the Americans remonstrated,
and, on finding their remonstrances disregarded, they adopted a system
of retaliation which occasioned much unmerited suffering to
individuals. Col. Ethan Allen, who had been defeated and made prisoner
in a bold but rash attempt against Montreal, was put in irons and sent
to England as a traitor. In retaliation, General Prescott, who had been
taken at the mouth of the Sorel, was put in close confinement for the
avowed purpose of subjecting him to the same fate which Colonel Allen
should suffer.

Both officers and privates, prisoners to the Americans, were more
rigorously confined than they would otherwise have been, and, that they
might not impute this to wanton harshness and cruelty, they were
distinctly told that their own superiors only were to blame for any
severe treatment they might experience.

The capture of General Lee became the occasion of embittering the
complaints on this subject, and of aggravating the sufferings of the
prisoners of war. Before that event something like a cartel for the
exchange of prisoners had been established between Generals Howe and
Washington, but the captivity of General Lee interrupted that
arrangement. The general, as we have seen, had been an officer in the
British army, but having been disgusted had resigned his commission,
and, at the beginning of the troubles, had offered his services to
Congress, which were readily accepted. General Howe affected to
consider him as a deserter, and ordered him into close confinement.
Washington had no prisoner of equal rank, but offered six Hessian field
officers in exchange for him, and required that, if that offer should
not be accepted, General Lee should be treated according to his rank in