tree. Once the brave
young man fell into a river, among floating ice, and would have been
drowned but for Gist.

At last they reached the house of a trader on the Monongahela River.
There they were kindly welcomed, and urged to stay until the weather
should grow milder.

But Washington would not delay.

Sixteen days after that, he was back in Virginia, telling the governor
all about his adventures, and giving his opinion about the best way to
deal with the French.

* * * * *

IX.--HIS FIRST BATTLE.

It was now very plain that if the English were going to hold the Ohio
Country and the vast western region which they claimed as their own,
they must fight for it.

The people of Virginia were not very anxious to go to war. But their
governor was not willing to be beaten by the French.

He made George Washington a lieutenant-colonel of Virginia troops, and
set about raising an army to send into the Ohio Country.

Early in the spring Colonel Washington, with a hundred and fifty men,
was marching across the country toward the head waters of the Ohio. It
was a small army to advance against the thousands of French and Indians
who now held that region.

But other officers, with stronger forces, were expected to follow close
behind.

Late in May the little army reached the valley of the Monongahela, and
began to build a fort at a place called Great Meadows.

By this time the French and Indians were aroused, and hundreds of them
were hurrying forward to defend the Ohio Country from the English. One
of their scouting parties, coming up the river, was met by Washington
with forty men.

The French were not expecting any foe at this place. There were but
thirty-two of them; and of these only one escaped. Ten were killed, and
the rest were taken prisoners.

This was Washington's first battle, and he was more proud of it than
you might suppose. He sent his prisoners to Virginia, and was ready now,
with his handful of men, to meet all the French and Indians that might
come against him!

And they did come, and in greater numbers than he had expected. He made
haste to finish, if possible, the fort that had been begun.

But they were upon him before he was ready. They had four men to his
one. They surrounded the fort and shut his little Virginian army in.

What could Colonel Washington do? His soldiers were already
half-starved. There was but little food in the fort, and no way to get
a