The difficulty which had been experienced in expelling the British from Boston, had demonstrated the importance of preventing their establishment in New York; and had contributed to the determination of contesting with them, very seriously, the possession of that important place. The execution of this determination, however, was difficult and dangerous. The defence of New York, against an enemy commanding the sea, requires an army capable of meeting him in the open field, and of acting offensively both on Long and York Islands. Congress had not adopted measures which might raise such an army. The Commander-in-chief, in his letters to that body, had long and earnestly urged the policy of bringing the whole strength of the country into regular operation. The government was not inattentive to his remonstrances; but many circumstances combined to prevent such a military establishment as the exigency required. The congress which assembled in 1775 had adjourned with strong hopes that the differences between the Mother Country and the Colonies would soon be adjusted to their mutual satisfaction. When the temper manifested both by the king and his parliament had dissipated these hopes, and the immense preparations of Great Britain for war, evinced the necessity of preparations equally vigorous on the part of America, the resolution to make them was finally taken. But, unaccustomed to the great duties of conducting a war of vast extent, they could not estimate rightly the value of the means employed, nor calculate the effects which certain causes would produce. Opinions of the most pernicious tendency prevailed; from which they receded slowly, and from which they could be ultimately forced only by melancholy experience. The most fatal among these was the theory, that an army could be created every campaign for the purposes of that campaign; and that such temporary means would be adequate to the defence of the country. They relied confidently on being able on any emergency, to call out a force suited to the occasion:--they relied too much on the competence of such a force to the purposes of war, and they depended too long on the spirit of patriotism, which was believed to animate the mass of the people.