5 There was something which required explanation in what was written by General Washington's Secretary and, undoubtedly, with his approval, to the President of the OongresB, when he said, " Our post, from " its situation, is not so advantageous as could be wished ; and was only " intended as temporary and occasional, till the Stores belonging to the " Army, which had been deposited, here, could be removed." -- (Colonel Robert H. Harrison to the President of the Congress, " White-Plains, 29 "October, 1776."

" The Stores belonging to the Army," at that time and for some time previous, had not been so abundant as to have been burdensome ; and, if there had been judicious oversight, they could have heen carried a couple of miles further, to a place of greater safety, when they were carried to the White Plains, saving the repeated re-handling of them and the construction of two distinct lines of works for nothing else than for the " temporary and occasional" protection of them.

There is, generally, a prodigality in the expenditure of both money and materials and labor, in all which relates to Armies ; but there seems to have been an excess of prodigality in the use of all these, of which the American Army had such an insufficient supply, if the only purpose of the two lines of entrenchments, one at the foot and the other on the crest of the high grounds, at the White Plains, had been only for the "temporary and occasional " protection of a few Stores, handled and rehandled, over and over again, the whole of which could have heen consumed by the Army, in less than six days, probably in half that time.*