nathanael greene, his chief lieutenant, was sent to the continental congress, and in december, they worked out an understanding, first of all, that the continental congress would be the supreme body representing the sovereignty of the people in america. and the generals would obey. but the generals would be allowed to get on with the war. and that was a very unstable compromise, but in a rough way, it worked. then washington also worked out a way in which his counsels at war, unlike the british counsels, were very open. anybody could come in. many other civilians were invited. and washington cultivated two gifts that i think were critical to his leadership. first, he had the gift of listening. he was beginning to learn to listen to these people in his army. and the other was that he had the gift of silence. he could keep quiet about his own opinions and reserve his views until the discussion had pretty much run its course. then he would intervene and nobody was in doubt as to who was running the army, but he chose to run it by that open way. and then he went about business of reordering in