"The British cavalry are upon us!" shouted Wilkinson in consternation. "Where?" exclaimed Lee, springing from his chair. "Right here, around the house," answered Wilkinson, who beheld a detachment of British cavalry surrounding the tavern. "Where are the guards?" cried out Lee, in his surprise and horror. "Why don't they fire?" It was a cold morning, and the guards had stacked their arms, and passed around to the south side of the house to sun themselves. They scarcely observed the enemy's presence until they heard the demand to surrender. "If General Lee does not surrender in five minutes I will set fire to the house!" At the same time the guards were chased in different directions. The demand for Lee to surrender was repeated, and he did surrender. Hastily he was put upon Wilkinson's horse, which stood at the door, and within three hours the enemy were exulting over him at Brunswick. "No one to blame but himself," remarked Heath. "Good enough for him," said many Americans. General Sullivan was now in command, and he joined the commander-in-chief as soon as possible. In Wilkinson's memoir it is said that Lee delayed so strangely in order to intercept the enemy in pursuit of Washington; and it is added: "If General Lee had anticipated General Washington in cutting the cordon of the enemy between New York and the Delaware, the commander-in-chief would probably have been superseded. In this case Lee would have succeeded him." Washington was too magnanimous to exult over the fall of Lee. Notwithstanding his knowledge of Lee's plans to supersede him, he wrote to his brother: "Before you receive this letter, you will undoubtedly have heard of the capture of General Lee. This is an additional misfortune; and the more vexatious, as it was by his own folly and imprudence, and without a view to effect any good, that he was taken. As he went to lodge three miles out of his own camp, and within twenty miles of the enemy, a rascally Tory rode in the night to give notice of it to the enemy, who sent a party of light-horse, who seized him, and carried him off with every mark of triumph and indignity." XX. BATTLES OF TRENTON AND PRINCETON. Washington was so anxious for the safety of Philadelphia, that he appointed General Putnam to command the post, with instructions to fortify the city at once. At the same time he advised Congress to remove to Baltimore; and that body, after hastily completing the business before them, adjourned to meet in the latter city on the 20th of December. By this time his army numbered about five thousand available men. One thousand militia from New Jersey, and fifteen hundred from Pennsylvania, with five hundred Germans from the latter State, was a very encouraging increase of his worn and wasted army. Then he had word that General Gates was coming on with seven regiments detached by Schuyler from the northern department. Washington was hopeful again, and began to plan an attack upon the enemy.