The suspicions of the young men were now thoroughly aroused. Making the traveler dismount, they searched every part of his clothing, but found nothing of importance. "Try his boots," said Van Wart. They compelled him to sit upon a log by the road-side, and, pulling off his boots, they discovered, by the bagging of his stocking-feet, several papers. These Paulding, the only one of the young men who could read, glanced over and exclaimed: "My God! he is a spy!" Major John André, adjutant-general of the British army, was their prisoner, but they did not know it. They believed that he was a British officer, as he himself at first announced. They questioned him closely about the papers in his boots, but he became very reticent. He offered them large bribes to induce them to let him pass. He offered them his gold watch. They refused. "I will give you a hundred guineas and any amount of dry goods," he said. They refused. "I will give you a thousand guineas," he said, "and you can hold me as a hostage till one of your number return with the money." "We would not let you go for ten thousand guineas!" said Paulding, in a loud voice. That decision settled the fate of André. The prisoner then requested his captors to take him to the nearest American post, and ask him no more questions. They complied. He was seated on his horse, which one of them alternately led, while the others marched alongside as guards. Such was the story of André's capture, as related by the three young men. Major André declared that the sole object of the captors in arresting him was evidently plunder; that they searched every part of him, even his saddle and his boots, for gold; and that, if he had possessed sufficient in specie (he had only some Continental bills), he might have easily persuaded them to let him go. But the preponderance of contemporary testimony is in favor of the captors' story. Washington wrote to Congress: "Their conduct merits our warmest esteem, and I beg leave to add that I think the public would do well to grant them a handsome gratuity. They have prevented, in all probability, our suffering one of the severest strokes that could have been meditated against us." [Illustration: John Paulding (From a Miniature in possession of the late James K. Paulding.)] Congress complimented the captors on their fidelity and patriotism by a resolution of thanks, ordered that an annuity of two hundred dollars in specie should be paid to each out of the public treasury, and directed the Board of War to have a silver medal of appropriate design struck and given to each. These medals Washington presented to the captors in person. Tradition tells us that André would undoubtedly have been released but for the strong will and patriotic impulses of John Paulding, then only twenty-two years of age.