The brief reception being over, at Cape's Tavern, (with presenting of addresses to Gen. Washington and Gov. Clinton), the cavalcade again formed, and marched to the Battery, to enact the last formality in re-possessing the City, which was to unfurl the American flag over Fort George.[5] A great concourse of people had assembled, not only to witness this ceremony, but to obtain a sight of the illustrious Washington and other great generals, who had so nobly defended our liberties. But now a sight was presented, which, as soon as fully understood, drew forth from the astonished and incensed beholders execrations loud and deep. The royal ensign was still floating as usual over Fort George; the enemy having departed without striking their colors, though they had dismantled the fort and removed on shipboard all their stores and heavy ordnance, while other cannon lay dismounted under the walls as if thrown off in a spirit of wantonness. On a closer view it was found that the flag had been nailed to the staff, the halyards taken away, and the pole itself besmeared with grease; obviously to prevent or hinder the removal of the emblem of royalty, and the raising of the Stars and Stripes. Whether to escape the mortification of seeing our flag supplant the British standard, or to annoy and exasperate our people were the stronger impulse, it were hard to say. It was too serious for a joke, however, and the dilemma caused no little confusion. The artillery had taken a position on the Battery, the guns were unlimbered, and the gunners stood ready to salute our colors. But the grease baffled all attempts to shin up the staff. To cut the staff down and erect another would consume too much time. Impatient of delay, "three or four guns were fired with the colors on a pole before they were raised on the flagstaff."[6] But this expedient was premature and humiliating, while the hostile flag yet waved as if in defiance. The scene grew exciting: and now appeared another actor, hitherto looking on, but no idle observer of what was passing. He was a young man of medium height, whose ruddy honest face, tarpaulin cap and pea-jacket told his vocation. Born neither to fortune nor to fame, yet by his own merits and exertions he had won the regard of some in that assembly, having served under McClaughry, and Willett, and Weissenfels, as also the Clintons, to whom he had lived neighbor, within that patriotic circle in old Orange, where these were the guiding spirits, and every yeoman with them, shoulder to shoulder, in the common cause. As a subaltern officer he had made a good record during the war, and none present, however superior in station, had sustained a better character or exhibited a purer patriotism. This was John Van Arsdale, late a Sergeant in Capt. Hardenburgh's company of New York Levies. At nineteen years of age, quitting his father's vessel, where he had been bred a sailor, he enlisted in the Continental Army at