advantageously posted, did not choose to attack them; and the whole
army returned to Philadelphia, having effected nothing.

He did not escape censure for having allowed the great advantage he
had acquired, to slip through his hands unused. He might with the
utmost certainty have reached Matron's ford before the Marquis, and
have cut off the only retreat which remained for him. But the same
skill and address were not displayed in executing this plan as in
forming it.[5]

[Footnote 5: It has been said that his troops were excessively
fatigued by a march of upwards of twenty miles, and that he waited,
confident that the Marquis could not escape him, for information that
Gray had reached his position.]

In the statement of this affair made by General Lafayette, he
represents himself to have advanced the head of a column towards
Grant, as if to attack him, while the rear filed off rapidly towards
the Schuylkill. This movement gained ground even for the front, which,
while it advanced towards the enemy, also approached the river, and at
the same time induced General Grant to halt, in order to prepare for
battle.

While this manoeuvre was performing in the face of the detachment
under Grant, a small party was thrown into the church yard, on the
road towards General Gray, which also gave the appearance of an
intention to attack in that quarter. By these dispositions, happily
conceived, and executed with regularity, the Marquis extricated
himself from the destruction which had appeared almost inevitable. In
a letter to congress, General Washington termed it "a timely and