The writings of George Washington; being his correspondence, addresses, messages, and other papers, official and private, selected and published from the original manuscripts; with a life of the author, notes and illustrations. By Jared Sparks.

152 LIFE OF WASHINGTON. [1775.
a risk of making enemies of those, who were willing to
be friends.
General Gage commanded the British troops in Boston. Prisoners had fallen into his hands on the eventful
day at Bunker's Hill, and he had seized other persons
accused of disaffection to the King. These he had
thrown indiscriminatelyinto prison, no distinction being
made between officers, soldiers, and citizens. The
report went abroad, that they were treated with great
severity. Justice to his country, and the calls of humanity, made it incumbent on Washington to remonstrate against such conduct. He wrote to the British general. The occasion awakened recollections of
more than common interest. Just twenty years had
elapsed since he and Gage fought side by, side on the
bloody battle-field of the Monongahela. An intimacy
then subsisted between them, which was cherished
afterwards by a friendly correspondence. Far different
was the relation in which they now stood to each other,
at the head of contending armies; the one obeying the
commands of his sovereign, the other upholding the
cause of an oppressed people.
Their letters were significant of the change. The
remonstrance of Washington, clothed in dignified but
pointed language, represented the impolicy as well as
cruelty of ill treatment to prisoners, since it would
impose upon him the necessity of retaliating, and there
would be no end to the horrors of war, if such a system
were pursued. General Gage denied the charge of
harsh usage, and took credit to himself for his clemency
in sparing persons, "whose lives by the law of the land
were destined to the cord." As to difference of rank,
he professed not to know any, which was not derived
from the King.