To the eyes of nearly every man but the commander-in-chief, this momentary relief seemed only an interval of additional agony between the sentence and execution, for ultimate escape appeared impossible. The most sanguine believed that Philadelphia would fall before the month was out. Congress, which had been in session there, hurried off to Baltimore. Meantime, the British, in secure possession of New Jersey, issued a proclamation, requiring every inhabitant to lay down his arms and take the oath of allegiance; and hundreds, who had been among the most enthusiastic for resistance, but who now despaired of success, hastened to purchase mercy by a timely submission. Even gentlemen high in rank on the side of the Colonies wavered in their patriotism. The panic was universal. The hurricane seemed about to prostrate every thing before it. In the gloom of this awful tempest, Washington, almost alone, stood unappalled. Not for one moment did his constancy forsake him. He saw the full peril of his situation; but he brought to it the resources of his mighty genius, and the unshaken resolution of his giant soul. Never, in any period of his life, was he greater than in this. No hint of submission crossed his mind. “If Philadelphia falls,” he said in public, “we must retreat to the Susquehanna, and thence, if necessary, beyond the Alleghenies.” From the moment he had crossed the Delaware, he had been revolving in his mind a plan to change, by one bold act, the whole aspect of the war. The British, instead of being concentrated in some central point, were scattered in detachments over New Jersey, a proceeding they had adopted for the convenience of forage, believing their enemy utterly powerless for aggressive measures. Washington resolved to take advantage of this error, and to strike at several of these detachments at once. He learned that fifteen hundred men, principally Hessians, were cantoned at Trenton, and that smaller bodies lay at Bordentown, Burlington, Mount Holly, and neighboring villages. To cut off one or all of these from the main army was his design.