Surely the histonan could not have been sincere when he described the hurried movement of the Regiment commanded by Colonel Smallwood, on the twelfth of October, to oppose the progress of the enemj' from Throgg's-neck, as a " retirement of the American Army from New " York ; " and because the weight of his authorities, in support of his fancy, was confined to a single letter, written by the Adjutjiut-general of the Army to his wife, on the day after the enemy lauded on Throgg'sneck, in which that officer said, " The principal part of this Army is "moved off this islaud " -- a movement from the works on Harlem Heights, which was only for the purpose of holding the enemy in check, and that not, by any means, in fact, approaching a moveuieut of "the " principal part of the Army," m»r with either an intimation or a pretense that it was a " retirement of the American Army " from its strong position-- without any other testimony whatever to support it, we are constrained to attribute the statement under consideration, either to have been an ebullition of his antipathy against General Lee or one of the reasonable results of his ignorance of what was necessary to constitute a "retirement of the American Army from New Y'ork."

It would have been more creditable to the authorial reputation of that venerable writer of history, had he read what General Washington instructed his Secretary to write to the President of the Congress, on the seventeenth of October, the day after the Council had advised him of the inexpediency of holding the Heights of Harlem, with the main body of the Army, on the subject of the " change of our disposition, to couDtcr- " act the operations of the enemy, declining an attack on our front." Had he read that very simple statement, he would have ascertained that the Commander in chief was not aware, on the seveuteeuth of October, that any portion of the .\rmy, at that time, had been " taken from " hence," in the sense of a " retirement of the Army ;" that the " change "of the disposition" of the Army had not, then, been made; that that proposed "change of our disposition" was frankly stated to have been *' determined " on, in the Council of General Officers, on the preceding day ; and that " Gener;il Lee, who arrived on Monday, had strongly "urged the absolute necessity of the measure," not yet executed.