Again Sir William sent a message of conciliation to the Congress, by the hands of General Sullivan, his prisoner. On the 11th of September, before the next movement of arms, Dr. Franklin, Mr. John Adams, and Mr. Edward Rutledge met Lord Howe and Sir William, as commissioners from the Congress, to discuss possible terms of accommodation. Dr. Franklin had been in London until March. During the past winter he had more than once met Lord Howe in earnest conference about American affairs, the ministers wishing to find through him some way, if it were possible, of quieting the colonies. But the ministers had not been willing then to make the concessions which might have ended the trouble, and their commissioners were not authorized to make them now; and the conference with the representatives of the Congress came to nothing, as the conferences in London had come to nothing. [Illustration: HOWE’S PROCLAMATION PREPARATORY TO LEAVING BOSTON] Washington could no more hold Manhattan Island with the forces at his command than he could hold Brooklyn heights. He had no choice in the end but to retire. General Howe was cautious, moved slowly, and handled his forces with little energy or decision; Washington made stand and fought at every point at which there was the least promise of success. His men and his commanders were shamefully demoralized by their defeat on Long Island, but he held them together with singular tact and authority: repulsed the enemy at Haarlem heights (September 16th), held his own before them at White Plains (October 28th),—and did not feel obliged to abandon the island until late in November, after General Greene had fatally blundered by suffering three thousand of the best trained men of the scant continental force, with invaluable artillery, small-arms, and stores, to be trapped and taken at Fort Washington (November 16th). When he did at last withdraw, and leave Howe in complete control of the great port and its approaches, the situation was indeed alarming. He had been unspeakably stung and disquieted, as he withdrew mile by mile up the island, to see how uncertain his men were in the field,—how sometimes they would fight and sometimes they would not at the hot crisis of a critical encounter; and now things seemed to have gone utterly to pieces. He might at any moment be quite cut off from New England. While he still faced Howe on Manhattan Island, General Carleton, moving with a British force out of Canada, had driven Benedict Arnold up Champlain, despite stubborn and gallant resistance (October 11th and 13th), and on the 14th of October had occupied Crown Point. There he had stopped; and later news came that he had withdrawn. But apparently he could strike again almost when he pleased, and threaten all the long line of the Hudson even to where Howe lay at New York itself. [Illustration: EVACUATION OF BROOKLYN HEIGHTS]