[Footnote 7: Letter of Sir Henry Clinton.] General Lee had made dispositions for executing the orders given the preceding evening, and repeated in the morning; and, soon after the British rear had moved from its ground, prepared to attack it. General Dickenson had been directed to detach some of his best troops, to take such a position as to co-operate with him; and Morgan was ordered to act on the right flank. Lee appeared on the heights of Freehold soon after Lord Cornwallis had left them; and, following the British into the plain, ordered General Wayne to attack the rear of their covering party with sufficient vigour to check it, but not to press it so closely as either to force it up to the main body, or to draw reinforcements to its aid. In the mean time, he intended to gain the front of this party by a shorter road, and, intercepting its communication with the line, to bear it off before it could be assisted. [Illustration: Martha Washington _From the portrait by Gilbert Stuart_ _After studying under Benjamin West, the American painter who succeeded Sir Joshua Reynolds as (second) president of the Royal Academy in London, Gilbert Stuart established a studio in Philadelphia where he met and painted the first of his famous portraits of George Washington. This one of Martha Washington, the best known likeness of her in existence, was painted in the city of Washington, where the artist had a studio between 1800 and 1802. She gave him several sittings at Mount Vernon._] While in the execution of this design, a gentleman in the _suite_ of General Washington came up to gain intelligence; and Lee communicated to him his present object. Before he reached the point of destination, there was reason to believe that the British rear was much stronger than had been conjectured. The intelligence on this subject being contradictory, and the face of the country well calculated to conceal the truth, he deemed it adviseable to ascertain the fact himself.