It was a long letter but above is as much of it as can claim admission to these pages.

“Who but she could write such a letter?” Jack asked himself, and then he held it to his lips a moment.  It thrilled him to think that even then she was probably in Boston.  In the tent where he and Solomon lived when they were both in camp, he found the scout.  The night before Solomon had slept out.  Now he had built a small fire in front of the tent and lain down on a blanket, having delivered his report at headquarters.

“Margaret is in Boston,” said Jack as soon as he entered, and then standing in the firelight read the letter to his friend.

“Thar is a real, genewine, likely gal,” said the scout.

“I wish there were some way of getting to her,” the young man remarked.

“Might as well think o’ goin’ to hell an’ back ag’in,” said Solomon.  “Since Bunker Hill the British are like a lot o’ hornets.  I run on to one of ’em to-day.  He fired at me an’ didn’t hit a thing but the air an’ run like a scared rabbit.  Could ‘a’ killed him easy but I kind o’ enjoyed seein’ him run.  He were like chain lightnin’ on a greased pole—­you hear to me.”

“If the General will let me, I’m going to try spy duty and see if I can get into town and out again,” he proposed.

“You keep out o’ that business,” said Solomon.  “They’s too many that know ye over in town.  The two Clarkes an’ their friends an’ Colonel Hare an’ his friends, an’ Cap.  Preston, an’ a hull passle.  They know all ‘bout ye.  If you got snapped, they’d stan’ ye ag’in’ a wall an’ put ye out o’ the way quick.  It would be pie for the Clarkes, an’ the ol’ man Hare wouldn’t spill no tears over it.  Cap.  Preston couldn’t save ye that’s sart’in.  No, sir, I won’t ‘low it.  They’s plenty o’ old cusses fer such work.”

For a time Jack abandoned the idea, but later, when Solomon failed to return from a scouting tour and a report reached camp that he was captured, the young man began to think of that rather romantic plan again.  He had grown a full beard; his skin was tanned; his clothes were worn and torn and faded.  His father, who had visited the camp bringing a supply of clothes for his son, had failed, at first, to recognize him.

December had arrived.  The General was having his first great trial in keeping an army about him.  Terms of enlistment were expiring.  Cold weather had come.  The camp was uncomfortable.  Regiments of the homesick lads of New England were leaving or preparing to leave.  Jack and a number of young ministers in the service organized a campaign of persuasion and many were prevailed upon to reenlist.  But hundreds of boys were hurrying homeward on the frozen roads.  The southern riflemen, who were a long journey from their homes, had not the like temptation to break away.  Bitter rivalry arose between the boys of the north and the south.  The latter, especially the Virginia lads, were in handsome uniforms.  They looked down upon the awkward, homespun ranks in the regiments of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut.  Then came the famous snowball battle between the boys of Virginia and New England.  In the midst of it, Washington arrived and, leaping from his white horse, was quickly in the thick of the fight.  He seized a couple of Virginia lads and gave them a shaking.