learned much of woodcraft, and of the geography of this unexplored frontier country, and became familiar with the habits of the Indians in the camp and on the war-path. In fact, all the lessons which he learned at this time were of the greatest use to him in after life.

9. Three years were spent in this way, Washington passing the summers in surveying Lord Fairfax's land, and the winters principally at Mount Vernon.

10. When Washington was nineteen years of age Governor Dinwiddie, the governor of Virginia, appointed him a major of the militia, and made him adjutant-general of one of the four military districts into which the province was divided. Soon afterwards there arose those troubles between the English colonists and the French authorities in Canada which led to the famous "French and Indian War."

11. This was a contest to decide whether the English or the French should rule America. It began in 1756, lasted till 1763, and resulted in the overthrow of the French and the supremacy of the English. As Washington bore a leading part in the beginning of this struggle, it will be well to see how the difficulty

arose.

12. In the middle of the eighteenth century the French possessed Canada and Louisiana. They now set up a claim to the whole of the vast territory west of the Alleghany mountains, leaving to the English

colonies only the narrow strip of country along the Atlantic coast. Year by year the French continued their encroachments, and at length planned a chain of forts extending through the western parts of Pennsylvania and Virginia to the Ohio, and down that river and the Mississippi to New Orleans, which was then a French city.

13. When a few English settlers tried to locate in Western Pennsylvania, in the region where the Alleghany and Monongahela unite to form the Ohio river, the French troops at Fort Venango drove them away. When traders from the colonies went into that country to barter with the Indians they were seized and imprisoned.

14. Governor Dinwiddie now resolved to send a messenger to the French commander at Fort Venango, demanding an explanation of these injuries. He offered this delicate and important mission to several gentlemen, but each declined.

15. The distance to be traveled-mostly through the wilderness was five hundred miles; winter was at hand, and the journey was to be made without military escort, through a territory occupied by Indian tribes.

16. "I will go, sir," said the young surveyor, then twenty-one years of age; and as the governor knew how self-reliant, capable, and discreet he was, he gladly made Washington his ambassador.

HEADS FOR COMPOSITION.

I. WASHINGTON'S PARENTS: name of his father- of his mother-date and place of birth.

II. YOUTH OF WASHINGTON: character and influence of his mother his education-his qualities as a boy-traits of character-bodily traits.

III. WASHINGTON AS A SURVEYOR: employment by Lord Fairfax- -scene of his work-lessons he learned.

IV. WASHINGTON'S MISSION: its object-the governor and Washington.

51. Washington.

PART II.

Alleghany, pron. ăl′le-ghā-ny. ăm'bush, troops posted in a concealed place.

Du Quesne, pron. dū-kāne'. fôrm'al-ly, ceremoniously. Le Bœuf, pron. lě běf'.

mis'sion (mish'un), being sent by authority to transact business; an important errand. Monongahela, pron. mō-nonga-hē'la.

St. Pierre, pron. sāint pē-ār'.

1. LEAVING Williamsburg, then the capital of Virginia, on the last day of October, 1753, Washington, with three attendants, started for the West. Their route lay through the unbroken forest, up the course of the Potomac, to Cumberland, Maryland. Here he was joined by five others, including a guide and an Indian interpreter; and the party, climbing the rugged mountains, struck northwestward for the Monongahela.

2. The provisions were put in a canoe and sent down the stream; but the men on horseback reached the Ohio before the men in the boats. While waiting

their coming up, the young

surveyor was making a map of the country.

"Here is the place for a fort, and it will be a city some day," he said, as he stood on the point of land where the Alleghany and the Monongahela unite to form the Ohio, and where now the thousand furnaces of Pittsburg darken the sky.

3. It was seventy miles up the course of the Alleghany to Fort Venango, which he reached in five weeks after the beginning of the journey. But the French officer there had

no authority to receive the letters, and Washington had to trudge through the snow for four weary

Necessity

A

VIRGINIA

MARYLAND

Ft.Cumberland

days to Fort Le

Boeuf, the head

quarters of St. Pierre, the chief commander. Having

delivered Governor Dinwiddie's communication, and

the homeward journey. The snow was deep, and the rivers were filled with ice. Worse still, the pack-horses broke down. Then Washington, with a single companion, quitted the usual path. He was in Indian dress, with gun in hand, and pack on his back.

5. At last they reached the Alleghany, which they found filled with floating ice. Having built a raft, they got on board with poles to push it across the stream.