d
more bitter. Let us be candid about it. The expulsion of the French from
the continent had freed the colonies from the danger of French
aggression and from the feeling that they needed the aid of the mother
country. That they should have been taxed to help defray the great
expense of this war against the French seems reasonable enough, but
there happened to be in power in England, at the time, a few obstinate
and bull-headed statesmen, serving under an obstinate and ignorant king,
and they handled the question of taxation with so little tact and
delicacy that, among them, they managed to rouse the anger of the
colonies to the boiling point.

For the colonists, let us remember, were of the same obstinate and
bull-headed stock, and it was soon evident that the only way to settle
the difference was to fight it out. But the impartial historian must
write it down that the colonies had much more to thank England for than
to complain about, and that at first, the idea of a war for independence
was not a popular one. As it went on, and the Tories were run out of the
country or won over, as battle and bloodshed aroused men's passions,
then it gradually gained ground; but throughout, the members of the
Continental Congress, led by John and Samuel Adams, were ahead
of public opinion.

As we have said, it soon became apparent that there was going to be a
fight, and independent companies were formed all over Virginia, and
started industriously to drilling. Washington, by this time the most
conspicuous man in the colony, was chosen commander-in-chief; and when,
at the gathering of the second Continental Congress at Philadelphia,
came news of the fight at Lexington and Concord, the army before Boston
was formally adopted by the Congress as an American army, and Washington
was unanimously chosen to command it. I wonder if any one foresaw that
day, even in the dimmest fashion, what immortality of fame was to come
to that tall, quiet, dignified man?

That was on the 15th day of June, 1775, and Washington left immediately
for Boston to take command of the American forces. All along the route,
the people turned out to welcome him and bid him Godspeed. Delegations
escorted him from one town to the next, and at last, on the afternoon of
July 2d, he rode into Cambridge, where, the next day, in the shadow of a
great elm on Cambridge Common, he took command of his army, and began
the six years' struggle which resulted in the establishment