Partisan exploit had, in fact, inflated the vanity and bewildered the imagination of Allen, and unfitted him for regular warfare. Still his name will ever be a favorite one with his countrymen. Even his occasional rhodomontade will be tolerated with a good-humored smile, backed as it was by deeds of daring courage; and among the hardy pioneers of our Revolution whose untutored valor gave the first earnests of its triumphs, will be remembered, with honor, the rough Green Mountain partisan, who seized upon the “Keys of Champlain.” In the letters of Schuyler, which gave Washington accounts, from time to time, of the preceding events, were sad repinings at his own illness, and the multiplied annoyances which beset him. “The vexation of spirit under which I labor,” writes he, “that a barbarous complication of disorders should prevent me from reaping those laurels for which I have unweariedly wrought since I was honored with this command; the anxiety I have suffered since my arrival here (at Ticonderoga), lest the army should starve, occasioned by a scandalous want of subordination and inattention to my orders, in some of the officers that I left to command at the different posts; the vast variety of disagreeable and vexatious incidents that almost every hour arise in some department or other,—not only retard my cure, but have put me considerably back for some days past. If Job had been a general in my situation, his memory had not been so famous for patience. But the glorious end we have in view, and which I have confident hope will be attained, will atone for all.” Washington replied in that spirit of friendship which existed between them. “You do me justice in believing that I feel the utmost anxiety for your situation, that I sympathize with you in all your distresses, and shall most heartily share in the joy of your success. My anxiety extends itself to poor Arnold, whose fate depends upon the issue of your campaign. * * * * * The more I reflect upon the importance of your expedition, the greater is my concern, lest it should sink under insuperable difficulties. I look upon the interests and salvation of our bleeding country in a great degree as depending upon your success.” Shortly after writing the above, and while he was still full of solicitude about the fate of Arnold, he received a despatch from the latter, dated October 13th, from the great portage or carrying-place between the Kennebec and Dead River. “Your Excellency,” writes Arnold, “may possibly think we have been tardy in our march, as we have gained so little; but when you consider the badness and weight of the bateaux, and large quantities of provisions, &c., we have been obliged to force up against a very rapid stream, where you would have taken the men for amphibious animals, as they were a great part of the time under water: add to this the great fatigue in the portage, you will think I have pushed the men as fast as they could possibly bear.”