Late in October, the American army advanced from Perkiomy to White Marsh; General Varnum’s Rhode Island Brigade, twelve hundred strong, reported for duty, as well as about a thousand additional troops from Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia. Generals Gates and Putnam still retained troops for their semi-independent commands; and General Gates, in particular, only grudgingly sent such as were peremptorily ordered to report to Washington. It was not until Colonel Hamilton, Aide-de-camp, visited him in person, that Gates sent the troops which were absolutely indispensable at army headquarters, and as absolutely useless at Albany. His ostentatious proclamation of his military success over Burgoyne, and his criticism of the tardiness and non-efficiency of his Commander-in-Chief, began to expose his renewed aspirations to succeed to the chief command. On the fourth of December, General Howe with a force of fourteen thousand men, accompanied by Generals Knyphausen and Cornwallis, advanced to Chestnut Hill, within three miles of the right of the American army, and slight skirmishing ensued. On the seventh, the British troops left Chestnut Hill, and took a position at Edge Hill near the American left. Morgan, just arrived from the northern army, and the Maryland militia under Colonel Mordecai Gist (subsequently Brigadier-General) had a sharp skirmish with Cornwallis, losing forty-four men and indicting an equal loss upon the enemy. Major-General Gray and the Queen’s Rangers indicted a loss of about fifty men upon an advance post of the American left; and when night came on, the British pickets were within a half mile of the American lines, where battle was awaited with satisfaction and hopeful expectancy. But on the morning of the eighth, the British camp disappeared, for Howe had suddenly returned to Philadelphia. [Illustration: Operations near Philadelphia.] Howe’s Report, dated December 13th, reads as follows: “Upon the presumption that a forward movement might tempt the enemy, after receiving such a reënforcement [reported afterwards as four thousand men], to give battle for the recovery of this place [Philadelphia]; or, that a vulnerable part might be found to admit of an attack upon their camp; the army marched out on the night of the fourth instant.” It was afterwards learned that Howe had full knowledge of the jealous spirit then existing towards Washington, and that several of his generals favored an attack upon Philadelphia, against his better judgment. Washington, in noticing Howe’s movement, says: “I sincerely wish that they had made the attack; as the issue, in all probability, from the disposition of our troops and the strong position of our camp, would have been fortunate and happy. At the same time, I must add, that reason, prudence, and every principle of policy, forbid us quitting our post to attack them. Nothing but success would have justified the measure; and this could not be expected from their position.”