There are occasions, when retaliation, applied to men of rank, may stop the progress of barbarity, yet the necessity should be clearly shewn, and the exercise restricted to such narrow limits, that no reasonable ground should be laid for counter-retaliation. Here, sixty innocent persons were deliberately butchered to revenge the death of three, and no proof offered that even those three were slain contrary to the laws of war; and though it is not to be doubted that the French committed many atrocities, some in wantonness, some in revenge, such savage deeds as the curate’s are inexcusable. What would have been said if Washington had hanged twenty English gentlemen, of family, in return for the death of captain Handy; or if sir Henry Clinton had caused twenty American officers, to die, for the execution of André? Like atrocities are, however, the inevitable consequence of a Guerilla system not subordinate to the regular government of armies, and ultimately they recoil upon the helpless people of the country, who cannot fly from their enemies. When the French occupied a district, famine often ensued, because to avoid distant forages they collected large stores of provisions from a small extent of country, and thus the Guerilla system, while it harassed the French, without starving them, both harassed and starved the people. And many of the chiefs of bands, besides their robberies, when they dared not otherwise revenge affronts or private feuds, would slay some prisoners, or stragglers, so as to draw down the vengeance of the French on an obnoxious village, or district. This in return produced associations of the people, for self-defence in many places, by which the enemy profited. [Sidenote: March.]