“General Howe cannot, by the best intelligence I have been able to get, have less than ten thousand men in New Jersey, and on board of transports at Amboy. Our number does not exceed four thousand. His are well-disciplined, well-officered and well-supplied; ours, raw militia, badly officered and under no government. His numbers cannot be, in short time, augmented; ours must be, very considerably, and by such troops as we can have some reliance on, or the game is at an end. His situation as to horses and forage is bad, very bad; but will it be better? No, on the contrary, worse; and therefore, if for no other, to shift quarters. General Howe’s informants are too numerous, and too well acquainted, to suffer him to remain in ignorance of them. With what propriety, then, can he miss so favorable an opportunity of striking a capital stroke against a city from which we draw so many advantages, the carrying of which would give such _éclat_ to his arms, and strike such a damp to ours. Nor is his difficulty of moving so great as is imagined. All the heavy baggage of the army, their salt provisions, flour and stores, might go round by water, while their superior numbers would enable them to make a sweep of the horses for many miles around them, not already taken off by us.” The separate movements suggested by Washington, some of which have been referred to, indicated his purpose to keep officers in the field wherever there promised opportunity for aggressive action, while at the same time enuring the militia to active field service.