tress of the seas, and the strongest military power upon the globe. The little handful of colonists, who stepped forth to meet this Goliah in deadly conflict, had neither fleet, army, military resources, nor supplies. The odds were so fearful, that it seems now strange that any courage could have met the encounter.

Defeat to Washington would prove not merely ruin, but inevitably an ignominious death upon the scaffold. Sublimely he stepped forward from his home of opulence and domestic joy, and accepted all the responsibilities of the post. The green in Lexington had already been crimsoned with the blood of patriots, and the battle of Bunker's Hill had rolled its echoes through Christendom. To a friend in England, Washington wrote,

"The Americans will fight for their liberties and property. Unhappy it is, though, to reflect that a brother's sword has been sheathed in a brother's breast, and that the once happy and peaceful plains of America are either to be drenched in blood or to be inhabited by slaves. Strange alternative! But can a virtuous man hesitate in his choice?"

To the Congress which elected him commander-in-chief of the American forces, he replied,

"I beg leave to assure the Congress, that, as no pecuniary consideration could have tempted me to accept this arduous employment at the expense of my domestic ease and happiness, I do not wish to make any profit from it. I will keep an exact account of my expenses. Those, I doubt not, they will discharge. That is all I desire."

To his wife, who was ever the object of his most respectful regard and tender affection, he wrote that it was his greatest affliction to be separated from her, but that duty called, and he must obey. He said that he could not decline the appointment without dishonoring his name, and sinking himself even in her esteem.

Twelve thousand British regulars were then intrenched on Bunker's Hill and in the streets of Boston. About fifteen thou sand provincial militia, wretchedly armed, and without any discipline, occupied a line nearly twelve miles in extent, encircling, on the land side, Charlestown and Boston. The British war-ships held undisputed possession of the harbor. These veterans could, apparently with ease, at any time, pierce the thin patriot line.

It requires long discipline to transform a man, just taken from

the endearments of home, into merely a part of that obedient, unquestioning machine called an army. A thousand trained soldiers are ever regarded as equal in military power to three or four times that number fresh from the pursuits of peaceful life. The British had opened fire at Lexington on the 19th of April, 1775. On the 2d of July, Washington arrived in Cambridge, and took command of the army. The ceremony took place under the elm-tree which still stands immortalized by the event. Gen. Gage was commander of the British forces. He had been the friend of Washington during the seven-years' war, and had fought by his side at the time of Braddock's defeat; and yet this Gen. Gage seized every patriot upon whom he could lay his hands in Boston, and threw them all, without regard to station or rank, into loathsome dungeons. To Gen. Washington's remonstrance against such barbarity, he returned the insolent reply,

"My clemency is great in sparing the lives of those who, by the laws of the land, are destined to the cord. I recognize no difference of rank but that which the king confers."

Washington at first resolved to retaliate upon the English prisoners. But his generous nature recoiled from the inhumanity of punishing the innocent for the crimes of the guilty. He countermanded the order, directing that the prisoners should be treated with all the humanity consistent with their security. In the subsequent and more successful war which the British Government waged against popular rights in Europe, they practised the same inhumanity. The French prisoners were thrown into hulks, and perished miserably by thousands. Napoleon, like Washington, refused to retaliate upon the helpless captives in his hands for the infamous conduct of their government.

At length, after surmounting difficulties more than can be enumerated, Washington was prepared for decisive action. In a dark and stormy night of March, he opened upon the foe, in the city, from his encircling lines, as fierce a bombardment as his means would possibly allow. Under cover of this roar of the batteries and the midnight storm, he despatched a large force of picked troops, with the utmost secrecy, to take possession of the Heights of Dorchester. There, during the hours of the night, the soldiers worked, with the utmost diligence, in throwing up breastworks which would protect them from the broadsides of the English fleet. Having established his batteries upon those heights, he

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commanded the harbor; and the English would be compelled to withdraw, or he would blow their fleet into the air.

In the early dawn of the morning, while the gale swept sheets of mist, and floods of rain, over earth and sea, the British admiral saw, to his consternation, that a fort bristling with cannon had sprung up, during the night, almost over his head. He immediately opened upon the works the broadsides of all his ships; but the Americans, defiant of the storm of iron which fell around them, continued to pile their sand-bags, and to ply their shovels, until ramparts so strong rose around them, that no cannonade could injure them. The British fleet was now at the mercy of Washington's batteries. In a spirit almost of desperation, the admiral ordered three thousand men in boats to land, and take the heights at every hazard. God came to the aid of the colonists. The gale increased to such fury, that not a boat could be launched. Before another day and night had passed, the redoubt could defy any attack.

The situation of the two parties was now very singular. The British fleet was at the mercy of the Americans: Boston was at the mercy of the English. "If you fire upon the fleet," said Gen. Howe, "I will burn the city." "If you harm the city," said Washington, "I will sink your fleet." By a tacit understanding, the English were permitted to retire unharmed, if they left the city uninjured.

It was the morning of the 17th of March, 1776. The storm had passed away. The blue sky overarched the beleaguered city and the encamping armies. Washington sat upon his horse, serene and majestic, and contemplated in silent triumph, from the Heights of Dorchester, the evacuation of Boston. Every gun of his batteries was shotted, and aimed at the hostile fleet. Every torch was lighted. The whole British army was crowded on board the ships. A fresh breeze from the west filled their sails; and the hostile armament, before the sun went down, had disappeared beyond the distant horizon of the sea. As the last boats, loaded to the gunwales with British soldiers, left the shore for the fleet, the exultant colonial army, with music and banners, marched over the Neck into the rejoicing city. It was a glorious victory, won by genius without the effusion of blood. Such another case, perhaps, history does not record. Washington, without ammunition, had maintained his post for six months within musket-shot