It was bad enough to be thus hampered, but he was even more fettered in other ways, for he could not even concentrate his forces and withdraw to the Highlands without a battle, as he was obliged to fight in order to sustain public feeling, and thus he was driven on to almost sure defeat.

With Brooklyn Heights in the hands of the enemy New York was untenable, and yet it was obvious that to hold Brooklyn when the enemy controlled the sea was inviting defeat.

Yet Washington under the existing conditions had no choice except to fight on Long Island and to say that he hoped to make a good defense.
Everything, too, as the day of battle drew near, seemed to make against him.

On August 22 the enemy began to land on Long Island, where Greene had drawn a strong line of redoubts behind the village of Brooklyn, to defend the heights which commanded New York, and had made every arrangement to protect the three roads through the wooded hills, about a mile from the intrenchments.

Most unfortunately, and just at the critical moment, Greene was taken down with a raging fever, so that when Washington came over on the 24th he found much confusion in the camps, which he repressed as best he could, and then prepared for the attack.