TO RICHARD HENRY LEE.
"Morristown, May 17, 1777.
"Dear Sir:—I take the liberty to ask you what Congress expects I am to do with the many foreigners they have at different times promoted to the rank of field-officers, and, by the last resolve, two to that of colonels.... These men have no attachment nor ties to the country, further than interest binds them. Our officers think it exceedingly hard, after they have toiled in this service and have sustained many losses, to have strangers put over them, whose merit, perhaps, is not equal to their own, but whose effrontery will take no denial.... It is by the zeal and activity of our own people that the cause must be supported, and not by a few hungry adventurers....
"I am, &c.,
"G. Washington."
[Vol. IV., p. 423.]