The Encouragement, at this time, to enlist is truly liberal and generous, namely, a bounty of twelve dollars, an annual and fully sufficient supply of good and handsome cloathing, a daily allowance of a large and ample ration of provisions, together with sixty dollars a year in gold and silver money on account of pay, the whole of which the soldier may lay up for himself and friends, as all articles proper for his subsistence and comfort are provided by law, without any expence to him. Those who may favour this recruiting party with their attendance as above will have an opportunity of hearing and seeing in a more particular manner the great advantages which these brave men will have who shall embrace this opportunity of spending a few happy years in viewing the different parts of this beautiful continent, in the honourable and truly respectable character of a soldier, after which he may, if he pleases, return home to his friends, with his pockets full of money and his head covered with laurels. GOD SAVE THE UNITED STATES.] And so the year 1777 dawned like a first year of settled war and revolution. For a little while, at the outset of the year, the Congress made Washington practical dictator in every affair that concerned the prosecution of the war. It authorized long enlistments, moreover, instead of the makeshift enrolments for three months which had hitherto kept Washington’s army always a-making and to be made, dissolving and reforming month by month. The Congress had, it is true, neither the energy nor the authority it needed. It could get little money to pay the troops; its agents seriously mismanaged the indispensable business of supplying the army with stores and clothing; and the men deserted by the score in disgust. Washington declared, in the summer of 1777, that he was losing more men by desertion than he was gaining by enlistment, do what he would. But these were difficulties of administration. In spite of all dangers and discouragements, it was evident that the continent was settling to its task. And the end of the year showed the struggle hopefully set forward another stage.