( 281 ) 



MAJOR ANDRE AND GENERAL ARNOLD. 



BY J. STIRLING COYNE. 



( Continued from page 33 J 



A FEW months had rolled by since the day on which Arnold had, by 

 the voice of his country, been declared unworthy to draw his sword 

 in her defence, amongst her brave defenders. During that period 

 the change which had taken place in his feelings had become more 

 deeply rooted, and his hatred of the cause in which he had so fre- 

 quently hazarded his life, more settled and dark. But as he knew 

 well that the open demonstration of his traitorous dispositions would 

 be the certain means of depriving him of the power to injure his 

 former friends, he, by the profoundest dissimulation, preserved the 

 semblance of a warm interest in the success of the American arms, 

 while he was secretly holding communication with Sir Henry Clinton, 

 the general of the English forces that then occupied the city of New 

 York. Too wary and suspicious to commit himself to any of the 

 numerous British emissaries that frequented his house, he opened his 

 mind by letter to a man high in the confidence of the English com- 

 mander. This was Charles Beverly Robinson, an American by birth, 

 who held the post of a colonel in the British army, but whose whole 

 property, being land, lay in the United States. To him Arnold first 

 intimated the desire he felt to atone for his rebellious opposition to 

 the arms of his rightful sovereign by returning to his allegiance, and, 

 to make his conversion to loyalty more acceptable, he hinted that he 

 had it in his power to render some signal service to the royal cause. 

 This overture was favourably received by Sir Henry Clinton, and the 

 price of his treachery having been arranged, it was agreed that 

 Arnold should continue to dissemble with the utmost care his discon- 

 tent, and seek every means to obtain from Washington a military 

 command, which he was to direct in such a manner as would be best 

 suited for the ulterior objects of his employers. From that moment 

 Arnold lost no opportunity of ingratiating himself with the repub- 

 lican leaders; he seemed to have forgotten the affront of the repri- 

 mand, and to feel a stronger interest than ever in the cause of 

 ^independence ; and so well did he succeed, that he obtained the 

 confidence of Livingston, then a member of congress, who believed 

 that he had been an injured man, and offered to use his influence 

 with Washington to obtain for him the chief command of the im- 

 portant fortress of West Point, which formed the key to the naviga- 

 tion of the Hudson, about twenty leagues above New York. To 

 obtain possession of this post, which had, under the superintendence 

 of the French engineers, been fortified with the utmost care, and was 

 provided with all the necessary munitions and defended by four 

 thousand men, became an object of paramount importance with the 

 English general ; he was not in a situation to carry the works by 

 assault, and it was evident that if the river continued impassable to 

 them so near to New York, he must either evacuate that city or 



