of Virginia, who determined upon sending
an ambassador to the French commanding officer on the Ohio demanding that
the French should desist from their inroads upon the territories of his
Majesty King George.

Young Mr. Washington jumped eagerly at the chance of distinction which
this service afforded him, and volunteered to leave his home and his
rural and professional pursuits in Virginia, to carry the governor's
message to the French officer. Taking a guide, an interpreter, and a few
attendants, and following the Indian tracks, in the fall of the year 1753
the intrepid young envoy made his way from Williamsburg almost to the
shores of Lake Erie, and found the French commander at Fort Le Boeuf.
That officer's reply was brief; his orders were to hold the place and
drive all the English from it. The French avowed their intention of
taking possession of the Ohio. And with this rough answer the messenger
from Virginia had to return through danger and difficulty, across lonely
forest and frozen river, shaping his course by the compass, and camping
at night in the snow by the forest fires.

On his return from this expedition, which he had conducted with an heroic
energy and simplicity, Major Washington was a greater favourite than ever
with the lady of Castlewood. She pointed him out as a model to both of
her sons. "Ah, Harry!" she would say, "think of you, with your
cock-fighting and your racing matches, and the Major away there in the
wilderness, watching the French, and battling with the frozen rivers! Ah,
George! learning may be a very good thing, but I wish my elder son were
doing something in the service of his country!"

Mr. Washington on his return home began at once raising such a regiment
as, with the scanty pay and patronage of the Virginian government, he
could get together, and proposed with the help of these men-of-war to put
a more peremptory veto upon the French invaders than the solitary
ambassador had been enabled to lay. A small force under another officer,
Colonel Trent, had already been despatched to the west, with orders to
fortify themselves so as to be able to resist any attack of the enemy.
The French troops greatly outnumbering ours, came up with the English
outposts, who were fortifying themselves at a place on the confines of
Pennsylvania where the great city of Pittsburg now stands. A Virginian
officer with but forty men was in no condition to resist twenty times
that number of Canadians who a