A Soldier of Manhattan Author:Joseph Alexander Altsheler Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. A GLIMPSE OF THE GENERAL. But when I was in the street alone my mind returned to more serious things, and my spirits fell again. I regretted t... more »he quarrel with Spencer, for it was like to be renewed, though as sure as ever that I had been in the right. Not wishing to return just then to my quarters, I strolled about in the cool of the evening. Ours always had been a lively town, but the turmoil of the war and the presence of the soldiery and the dignitaries had caused an exceeding great bustle lately. The arrival of night scarce served to diminish it. The number of street lanterns had been doubled, and the number of night watchmen, too, for that matter, as the coming of the soldiers caused much disorder, and there had been many broils. It was only the other day that I had heard some of our most respected burghers complaining of the bad effect the presence of the military had on public morals. There was a crowd in the streets, and soldiers were straying about the Battery. Several of the military people showed signs of intoxication. I wondered at this laxity of discipline, for I had read much in the books about the art of war, and I found them all agreed that strict rules and an enforced obedience to them were the ingredients of success. Now when I was confronted with the reality, I found the differencebetween it and what I had expected so great that I was puzzled to account for it. Nor did it comfort me to observe two or three of our own New York soldiers among the roisterers. I thought that at a time when our arms had experienced such ill success everywhere it would be mightily gratifying to the home people for our own colonial soldiers to set a good example. Two soldiers approached me. One was in the uniform of the British grenadiers. The other wore the ...« less