the fruit of well-considered plans which were shaped with full
confidence in success.

Battles and campaigns have been separated from their true relation to
the war, as a systematic conflict, in which the strategic issue was
sharply defined; and too little notice has been taken of the fact that
Washington took the aggressive from his first assumption of command. The
title "Fabius of America" was freely conferred upon him after his
success at Trenton; but there was a subtle sentiment embodied in that
very tribute, which credited him with the political sagacity of the
patriot and statesman, more than with the genius of a great soldier. All
contemporaries admitted that he was judicious in the use of the
resources placed at his command, that he was keen to use raw troops to
the best possible disposal, and took quick advantage of every
opportunity which afforded relief to his poorly-fed and poorly-equipped
troops, in meeting the British and Hessian regulars; but there were few
who penetrated his real character and rightly estimated the scope of his
strategy and the sublime grandeur of his faith.

The battles of that war (each is its place) have had their immediate
results well defined. To see, as clearly their exact place in relation
to the entire struggle, and that they were the legitimate sequence of
antecedent preparation, requires that the preparation itself shall be
understood.

The camps, redoubts, and trenches, which engirdled Boston during its
siege, were so many appliances in the practical training-school of war,
which Washington promptly seized, appropriated, and developed. The
capture of Boston was not the chief aim of Washington, when, on the
third day of July, 1775, he established his headquarters at Cambridge.