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“Ah, Deborah, the Major is going to leave us entirely, just going. I will see him first.”

And on the next day, “He has gone. I saw him pass the bridge. The woods hindered us from following him farther. I seem to fancy he will return in the evening.”

But he never did, and it is left to our imagining how much of her heart the gallant young officer took away with him. Whether much or little, there was no evidence of her loss of spirits, and other admirers came and went, in quick succession and apparently entirely engaged her attention.

On the 20th of December, she writes, “General Washington’s army have gone into winter quarters at Valley Forge.

“We shall not see so many of the military now. We shall be very intimate with solitude. I am afraid stupidity will be a frequent guest,” and again, “A dull round of the same thing. I shall hang up my pen till something happens worth relating.”

There being such a lack of diversion at the farm, Sally gladly went to spend a week with her friend Polly Fishbourn at Whitemarsh, where she had an opportunity to climb the barren hills and from their tops saw an extended view of the surrounding country. She says, “The traces of the Army which encamped on these hills are very visible,–ragged huts, imitations of chimneys, and many other ruinous objects which plainly showed that they had been there.”

Again back at the farm she had long weeks without any other real adventures,–a real one where Sally was concerned, being always one with an officer in the foreground, but when June came again there arrived at the farm the Virginian captain, Dandridge, who seems to have effectually displaced Major Stoddard in the fickle little lady’s graces, and she described him in glowing terms to Debby, giving very diverting accounts of the spicy conversations they had together, for Captain Dandridge was famous at repartee, and Sally never at a loss for words to answer back. In fact there is no more charming bit of writing in the journal than the account of her intimacy with the Captain whom she speaks of as the “handsomest man in existence.”

In one of Sally’s conversations with Dandridge, an interesting light is thrown on the attitude of the Wisters in the struggle for independence. As Quakers, they professed to be in a neutral position, taking a firm stand against war, and preferring not to be drawn into discussions on political questions, which is shown by Sally’s account of an evening when some officers having taken tea in the Wister parlour, she says, “the conversation turned on politicks, a subject to avoid. I gave Betsey a hint,” she adds; “I rose, she followed, and we went out of the room.” But although theoretically opposed to war, the Wisters, like a majority of the Quakers, were at heart friends of liberty. There is no doubt that Sally’s sympathy was with the American cause, she was quick to deny Dandridge’s accusation that she was a Tory.

All too soon, Captain Dandridge, like the other officers, rode away from the farm after a gallant leave-taking, but Sally’s thoughts were soon otherwise engrossed. She wrote, “We have had strange reports about the British being about to leave Philadelphia. I can’t believe it.”

And on the following day, “We have heard an astonishing piece of news–that the English have entirely left the city. It is almost impossible! Stay–I shall hear further,” and then on the next, “A light horseman has just confirmed the above intelligence! This is charmante ! They decamped yesterday. He (the horseman) was in Philadelphia. It is true! They have gone! Past a doubt. I can’t help forbear exclaiming to the girls, ‘Now are you sure the news is true? Now are you sure they have gone?’

“‘Yes, yes, yes!’ they all cry, ‘and may they never, never return!’