inhabitants of Philadelphia, whose satisfaction should have been
vigilantly consulted, both from gratitude and from interest. They
experienced many of the horrors of civil war. The soldiers insulted and
plundered them, and their houses were occupied as barracks without any
compensation being made to them. Some of the first families were
compelled to receive into their habitations individual officers who
were even indecent enough to introduce their mistresses into the
mansions of their hospitable entertainers. This soured the minds of the
inhabitants, many of whom were Quakers. But the residence of the army
at Philadelphia occasioned distresses which will probably be considered
by the generality of mankind as of a more grievous nature. It was with
difficulty that fuel could be got on any terms. Provisions were most
exorbitantly high. Gaming of every species was permitted and even
sanctioned. This vice not only debauched the mind, but by sedentary
confinement and the want of seasonable repose enervated the body. A
foreign officer held the bank at the game of faro by which he made a
very considerable fortune, and but too many respectable families in
Britain had to lament its baleful effects. Officers who might have
rendered honorable service to their country were compelled, by what was
termed a bad run of luck, to dispose of their commissions and return
penniless to their friends in Europe. The father who thought he had
made a provision for his son by purchasing him a commission in the army
ultimately found that he had put his son to school to learn the science
of gambling, not the art of war. Dissipation had spread through the
army, and indolence and want of subordination, its natural
concomitants. For if the officer be not vigilant the soldier will never
be alert.

"Sir William Howe, from the manners and religious opinions of the
Philadelphians, should have been particularly cautious. For this public