Col. Allen. Then I forgive you; but pray execute them.
Oh! my lost friends! 'tis liberty, not breath,
Gives the brave life. Shun slav'ry more than death.
He who spurns fear, and dares disdain to be,
Mocks chains and wrongs—and is forever free;
While the base coward, never safe, tho' low,
Creeps but to suff'rings, and lives on for woe!
[Exeunt Guards.
Scene III. In the Camp at Cambridge.
General Washington, General Lee, and General Putnam.
General Washington.
Our accounts from the Northward, so far, are very favourable; Ticonderoga, Chamblee, St. John's and Montreal our troops are already in possession of—and Colonel Arnold, having penetrated Canada, after suff'ring much thro' cold, fatigue and want of provisions, is now before Quebec, and General Montgomery, I understand, is in full march to join him; see these letters.
[They read.
Gen. Lee. The brave, the intrepid Arnold, with his handful of fearless troops, have dar'd beyond the strength of mortals—Their courage smil'd at doubts, and resolutely march'd on, clamb'ring (to all but themselves) insurmountable precipices, whose tops, covered with ice and snow, lay hid in the clouds, and dragging baggage, provisions, ammunition and artillery along with them, by main strength, in the dead of winter, over such stupendous and amazing heights, seems almost unparallelled in history!—'Tis true, Hannibal's march over the Alps comes the nearest to it—it was a surprising undertaking, but when compar'd to this, appears but as a party of pleasure, an agreeable walk, a sabbath day's journey.
Gen. Putnam. Posterity will stand amazed, and be astonish'd at the heroes of this new world, that the spirit of patriotism should blaze to such a height, and eclipse all others, should outbrave fatigue, danger, pain, peril, famine and even death itself, to serve their country; that they should march, at this inclement season, thro' long and dreary deserts, thro' the remotest wilds, covered with swamps and standing lakes, beset with trees, bushes and briars, impervious to the cheering rays of the sun, where are no traces or vestiges of human footsteps, wild, untrodden paths, that strike terror into the fiercest of the brute creation.