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congress constituted itself, and proceeded to organize the militia. General Gage, the British commander, was in the utmost perplexity how to meet or avert the storm. The militia preparations extended from colony to colony; and Virginia was no exception to the rule. Mount Vernon became an active centre of operations, and its owner laboured hard in drilling and reviewing the militia troops. He attended the second Virginia Convention, held this time at Richmond, and he agreed in the conviction of its best members that fighting had become at last necessary. It was hopeless to expect any peaceful settlement to the strife, though the prospect of independence had not dawned upon his mind. He offered to command an independent company which his brother was raising; for, he wrote to his brother: 'It is my intention to devote my life and fortune to the cause.' The battle of Lexington, fought on April 19, 1775, was the first blow in the long military struggle that resulted in the independence of the American colonies. Even yet Washington hung back from taking up arms against Britain. 'Unhappy it is,' he writes, 'to reflect that a brother's sword has been sheathed in a brother's breast; and that the once happy and peaceful plains of America are to be either drenched with blood or inhabited by slaves. Sad alternative! But can a virtuous man hesitate in his choice?' Round Boston, therefore, centred the struggle at first; and the militia poured into the revolutionary camp. Tried officers hastened to place their experience at the disposal of their country; and urgent letters were sent round to the colonies, asking for assistance. The second General Congress met in May 1775 at Philadelphia, and passed an act of perpetual union among the states. A scheme of federal government

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was drawn up and agreed to; and the various committees appointed in terms of it set to work heartily and courageously. Washington was chosen chairman of all committees dealing with military affairs, and his wisdom and experience soon became manifest in the rules and regulations for the army. The colonial forces, commanded in camp by General Artemas Ward, were now practically besieging the British troops in Boston; but there was lamentable want of supplies, of organization, of everything that was essential to an army about to enter on a campaign against the tried troops of Britain. The first essential was to appoint a commander-inchief, holding his commission from the Congress. eyes of the majority turned instinctively to Washington, though there were a few delegates, some even from Virginia, who opposed his nomination at first. But the public confidence in his tried valour and wisdom was too great to permit any issue but one. Immediately after the Congress had formally 'recognised' the troops under the title of the Continental Army, and had fixed the salary of the commander-in-chief at 500 dollars a month, Washington was proposed as candidate for the office, and elected unanimously by ballot. Washington himself had taken no steps to solicit the command; and when his election was formally announced to him in Congress, he first thanked the House for their trust, and added: 'But lest some unlucky event should happen, unfavourable to my reputation, I beg it may be remembered by every gentleman in the room that I this day declare with the utmost sincerity I do not think myself equal to the command I am honoured with. As to pay, I beg leave to assure the Congress that, as no pecuniary consideration could have tempted me to accept this arduous

employment at the expense of my domestic ease and happiness, I do not wish to make any profit of it. I will keep an exact account of my expenses. Those, I doubt not, they will soon discharge, and that is all I desire.'

Before the new general left Philadelphia to join the army before Boston, the famous battle of Bunker's Hill was fought (June 17, 1775); and this glorious defeat acted like a victory in sending a thrill of vigour and life through the colonies. On July 2, Washington rode into camp amidst the huzzas of the soldiers and the roaring of cannon. He placed his headquarters at Cambridge, and next morning formally assumed chief command of the army. The enthusiasm in his favour was intense, and his military reputation inspired every one with the utmost confidence and with the highest hopes for the future. His commanding and dignified mien, and his calm, self-reliant manner, as he rode through the camp, impressed the soldiers with the knowledge that a strong hand and a wise head had come to lead them. He was then in the prime of his manhood, midway between his forty-third and his forty-fourth year. The wife of John Adams, afterwards President, wrote of Washington on his arrival in camp: 'Dignity, ease, and complacency, the gentleman and the soldier, look agreeably blended in him. Modesty marks every line and feature of his face. Those lines of Dryden instantly occurred to me :

"Mark his majestic fabric! He's a temple
Sacred by birth, and built by hands divine.
His soul's the deity that lodges there,

Nor is the pile unworthy of the god!"'

A male critic observes :-'It was not difficult to distinguish him from all others. He is tall and well-proportioned, and his personal appearance truly noble and majestic.'

His first care was to inspect the forces at his disposal. These consisted of about 14,000 raw and untrained soldiers, badly equipped, poorly supplied with necessaries, and destitute of any adequate notion of military discipline. The contingents from the various provinces encamped each by itself, each under its own regulations, and mutual jealousy and dissatisfaction were the rule. The American camp extended in a semicircle of about eight miles, with the town of Boston, occupied by the British, as a focus. The works that protected this extended front were scanty and ill-made; and the available troops were far too few to man them efficiently. The apology that Washington made for the Massachusetts troops might have applied to all,-'their spirit had exceeded their strength.' The new general, trained under the rigid Braddock, and now in full view of an example of British military discipline and order, lost no time in setting about reform. The troops were massed in three more compact divisions; the respective positions of subordinate and superior insisted upon with severity; regiments were formed, and general orders read to them; to every one was assigned his duty; and disobedience was no longer honoured with the name of independence, but received the punishment of the cat. The material from which Washington had to form his soldiers was strange and rough; and rough measures were often necessary. On one occasion a dispute arose between a party of Virginian riflemen and a detachment from the Massachusetts seaboard. Words gave place to blows, and in a short while there was a gigantic riot, in which more than a thousand men were angrily struggling. Just then Washington rode up, followed only by his negro servant. Springing from his horse, the general rushed passionately into the 'thickest of the mêlée, seized two tall, brawny riflemen by the throat,

keeping them at arm's length, talking to and shaking them.' When Washington chanced to throw off his usual calm bearing and give vent to his strong indignation, it was not easily faced. Awed by his energy, and perhaps by his sudden appearance, the rioters dispersed in a moment, and Washington was left still clutching with an iron grasp his two compatriots. It was an effectual stoppage to the brawl; and all evil effects were averted by his rough and ready mode of maintaining discipline.

His difficulties were increased by the militia system according to which the army was recruited. One body of men had hardly been reduced to some strictness of military order before their time of service expired, and their place was taken by another raw detachment. Troops like these did not show the steadiness of regular soldiers in the field; they were liable to panic, and more than once failed at critical points. During the retreat from New York in 1776, the panic-stricken flight of certain Connecticut troops nearly resulted in the capture of General Washington, who was left almost alone, passionately endeavouring to rally his men, within eighty yards of the British advance guard. When nothing else hampered his movements, the inefficient and poverty-stricken mode in which the commissariat departments were managed fettered him. Not only food, but even the commonest necessaries in the way of clothing sometimes failed. A standing order that the soldiers should always have two days' provisions by them, so as to be ready for any sudden call, was a dead letter from the scarcity of food. From his camp in Valley Forge, Washington wrote in December 1777 that his supplies were so precarious that three or four days of bad weather would prove the destruction of the army. Few of his men, he wrote, had more than one shirt, many only the moiety of one, and some none at all.

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