Page:Historic towns of the middle states (IA historictownsofm02powe).pdf/331

 assembled when news came that the Treaty of Peace had been signed at Versailles. Many brilliant and beautiful women were present, and their unchecked delight doubled the enthusiasm of all. The reception was the most splendid public function thus far held by the now independent republic. On the twenty-fifth of November the British evacuated New York. Washington left Princeton to attend the ceremony, and afterward journeyed by Annapolis to his home at Mt. Vernon. He believed that, his military career being concluded, he was to spend the rest of his days as a private gentleman.

Providence had ordained otherwise. He had carried the difficult, strange and desultory War of the Revolution to a successful end; he had, by wise counsel and firmness, averted the dangers of a civil war which seemed imminent, so far as he could judge from the temper of those about his headquarters at Newburgh. Once more he was to enter the arena of embittered strife, but in a conflict political and not military. Three of the five great actions in which he was personally present during the Revolution were fought on Jersey soil; his next leadership was displayed in a contest waged in Philadelphia, but largely by Jersey