The inspection of the Commander-in-Chief had been made. Immediately, the troops were put to work perfecting earthworks, building redoubts, and policing camp. “Observance of the Sabbath” was enforced. Officers were court-martialed, and soldiers were tried, for “swearing, gambling, fraud, and lewdness.” A thorough system of guard and picket duty was established, and the nights were made subservient to rest, in the place of dissipation and revelry. Discipline was the first indication that a Soldier was in command. These statements, which are brief extracts from his published Orders, fall far below a just review of the situation as given by Washington himself. From some of his reports to Congress it would seem as if, for a moment, he almost despaired of bringing the army to a condition when he might confidently take it into an open field, and place it, face to face, against any well-appointed force of even inferior numbers. That he was enabled so to discipline an army that, as at Brandywine, they willingly marched to meet a British and Hessian force one-half greater than his own in numbers, became a complete justification of the patience and wise persistence with which he handled the raw troops in camp about Cambridge, in the year 1775. His next care was “the practical art of bringing the army fully equipped to the battlefield,” known as the “Logistics of War.” The army was deficient in every element of supply. The men, who still held their Colonial obligation to be supreme, came and went just as their engagements would permit and the comfort of their families required. Desertion was regarded as nothing, or at the worst but a venial offence, and there were times when the American army about Boston, through nine miles of investment, was less in number than the British garrison within the city. But the deficiency in the number of the men was not so conspicuous and disappointing as the want of powder, lead, tools, arms, tents, horses, carts, and medical supplies. Ordinary provisions had become abundant. The adjacent country fed them liberally and supplied many home-made luxuries, not always the best nourishment for a soldier’s life; but it was difficult to persuade the same men that all provisions must enter into a general commissariat, and be issued to all alike; and that such stores must be accumulated, and neither expended lavishly nor sold at a bargain so soon as a surplus remained unexpended. Such articles as cordage, iron, horseshoes, lumber, fire-wood, and every possible thing which might be required for field, garrison, or frontier service, were included in his inventory of essential supplies.