itary duties. It is an expedition that may be
considered the foundation of his fortunes. From that moment he was the
rising hope of Virginia.

CHAPTER V.
MILITARY EXPEDITION TO THE FRONTIER.

The reply of the Chevalier de St. Pierre was such as might have been
expected from that courteous, but wary commander. He should transmit,
he said, the letter of Governor Dinwiddie to his general, the Marquis
du Quesne, "to whom," observed he, "it better belongs than to me to
set forth the evidence and reality of the rights of the king, my
master, upon the lands situated along the river Ohio, and to contest
the pretensions of the King of Great Britain thereto. His answer shall
be a law to me."

This was considered evasive, and only intended to gain time. The
information given by Washington of what he had observed on the
frontier convinced Governor Dinwiddie and his council that the French
were preparing to descend the Ohio in the spring, and take military
possession of the country. Washington's journal was printed, and
widely promulgated throughout the colonies and England, and awakened
the nation to a sense of the impending danger and the necessity of
prompt measures to anticipate the French movements.

Captain Trent was dispatched to the frontier, commissioned to raise a
company of one hundred men, march with all speed to the fork of the
Ohio, and finish as soon as possible the fort commenced there by the
Ohio Company. He was enjoined to act only on the defensive, but to
capture or destroy whoever should oppose the construction of the
works, or disturb the settlements. The choice of Captain Trent for
this service, notwithstanding his late inefficient expedition, was
probably owing to his being brother-in-law to George Croghan, who had
grown to be quite a personage of consequence on the frontier, where he
had an establishment, or trading-house, and was supposed to have great
influence among the western tribes, so as to be able at any time to
persuade many of them to take up the hatchet. Washington was empowered
to raise a company of like force at Alexandria; to procure and forward
munitions and supplies for the projected fort at the fork, and
ultimately to have command of both companies.

Governor Dinwiddie in the meantime called upon the governors of the
other provinces to make common cause against the foe; he endeavored,
also, to effect alliances with the Indian tribes of the south, the
Catawbas and Cherokees, by