{48} "The flag is down!" "The fort has surrendered!" cry the people of Charleston, with pale faces and tearful eyes. Out from one of the cannon openings leaps Sergeant William Jasper. Walking the whole length of the fort, he tears away the flag from the staff. Returning with it, he fastens it to the rammer of a cannon, and plants it on the ramparts, amidst the rain of shot and shell. [Illustration: Sergeant Jasper saves the Flag] With the setting of the sun, the roar of battle slackens. The victory is Moultrie's. Twilight and silence fall upon the smoking fort. Here and there lights glimmer in the city, as the joyful people of Charleston return to their homes. The stars look down upon the lapping waters of the bay, where ride at anchor the shadowy vessels of the British fleet. Towards midnight, when the tide begins to ebb, the battered war ships slip their cables and sail out into the darkness with their dead. The next day, hundreds came from the city to rejoice with Moultrie and his sturdy fighters. Governor Rutledge came down with a party of ladies, and presented a silk banner to the fort. Calling for Sergeant Jasper, he took his own short sword from his side, buckled it on him, and thanked him in the name of his country. He also offered him a lieutenant's commission, but the young hero modestly refused the honor, saying, "I am not fitted for an officer; I am only a sergeant." For several days, the crippled British fleet lay in the harbor, too much shattered to fight or to go to sea. In {49} fact, it was the first week in August before the patriots of South Carolina saw the last war ship and the last transport put out to sea, and fade away in the distance. The hated redcoats were gone. In the ten hours of active fighting, the British fleet fired seventeen tons of powder and nearly ten thousand shot and shell, but, in that little inclosure of green logs and sand, only one gun was silenced. The defense of Fort Sullivan ranks as one of the few complete American victories of the Revolution. The moral effect of the victory was perhaps more far-reaching than the battle of Bunker Hill. Many of the Southern people who had been lukewarm now openly united their fortunes with the patriot cause. Honors were showered upon the brave Colonel Moultrie. His services to his state and to his country continued through life. He died at a good old age, beloved by his fellow citizens. {50} CHAPTER IV THE PATRIOT SPY It was plain that Washington was troubled. As he paced the piazza of the stately Murray mansion one fine autumn afternoon, he was saying half aloud to himself, "Shall we defend or shall we quit New York?" At this time Washington's headquarters were on Manhattan Island, at the home of the Quaker merchant, Robert Murray; and here, in the first week of September, 1776, he had asked his officers to meet him in council.