pany of Virginians, previously sneered at
as "raw militia," spread themselves out as a protecting party of
skirmishers. The English officers, also, be it said, displayed the
utmost bravery in trying to rally their men. The general, as though to
atone for his headstrong folly, seemed everywhere at once. He had two
horses shot from under him, before receiving wounds in his own body,
which were to prove mortal.

It was all over in a comparatively short time. The troops which had so
proudly marched, with arms glittering in the sun, were put to rout by
an unseen foe. That they were not almost annihilated was due to the
presence of Washington and the Virginians. They fought the enemy in
kind, and protected the fugitives until some sort of order could be
restored.

Washington it was who collected the troops and rescued the dying
general. He it was who led them back to meet the reinforcements under
Dunbar. And he it was who laid the remains of Braddock in the grave,
four days later, and read the burial service above him.

Again had the young soldier to taste the bitter dregs of defeat--but it
was salutary, and a part of the iron discipline which was making him
into the future leader.

That he had not lost any prestige by this experience, but rather gained
thereby, is shown by the call that came urgently to him, soon after, to
take command of all the forces of Virginia. He did not want the
command, but felt that after such a vote of confidence he could not
decline it. And so for three years more he struggled on, a general
without an army, to protect the western frontier of Virginia against
invasion. In April, 1757, he wrote:

"I have been posted for more than twenty months past, upon our cold and
barren frontiers, to perform, I think I may say, impossibilities; that
is, to protect from the cruel incursions of a crafty, savage enemy a
line of inhabitants, of more than three hundred and fifty miles in
extent, with a force inadequate to the task."

In the winter of 1758 his health broke down completely, and he feared
that it was permanently impaired. He resigned his commission and
retired to Mount Vernon for a much-needed rest.

Thus closes the first and formative period of Washington's life--the
period with which the present brief sketch is chiefly concerned. As we
read of those years of adventure and hardship from an early age, we
realize that here was being hammered into shape upon the anvil of
circumstance