Providence was the first settlement made in America which set its doors wide open to every one who wished to come and live there. Not only all Christians, but Jews, and even men who went to no church whatever, could go there and be at peace. This great and good work was done by Roger Williams. Providence grew in time to be the chief city in the state of Rhode Island. When the Revolution began, every man and boy in the state, from sixteen to sixty, stood ready to fight for liberty.

[Footnote 6: Seekonk (See'konk).]

[Footnote 7: "What Cheer Rock" is on the east side of the city of Providence.]

86. Summary.—Roger Williams, a young minister of Salem, Massachusetts, declared that the Indians, and not the king of England, owned the land in America. The governor of Massachusetts was afraid that if Mr. Williams kept on saying these things the king would hear of it and would take away the land held by the people of Boston and the other settlements. He therefore sent a constable to arrest the young minister and put him on board a ship going back to England. When Mr. Williams knew this, he fled to the Indian chief, Massasoit. In 1636 Roger Williams began building Providence. Providence was the first settlement in America which offered a home to all men without asking them anything whatever about their religious belief.

Who was Roger Williams? What is said about him and the Indians? Who did Mr. Williams think first owned the land in America? How did many of the people of Massachusetts feel about Mr. Williams? What did the chief men of Boston do? What did Mr. Williams do? Describe his journey to Mount Hope. What did Massasoit do for Mr. Williams? What did Mr. Williams do at Seekonk? What happened after that? Why did he name the settlement Providence? What is said of Providence? What about the Revolution?



KING PHILIP (Time of the Indian War, 1675-1676).

87. Death of Massasoit; Wamsutta[1] and Philip; Wamsutta's sudden death.—When the Indian chief Massasoit[2] died, the people of Plymouth lost one of their best friends. Massasoit left two sons, one named Wamsutta, who became chief in his father's place, and the other called Philip. They both lived near Mount Hope, in Rhode Island.

The governor of Plymouth heard that Wamsutta was stirring up the Indians to make war on the whites, and he sent for the Indian chief to come to him and give an account of himself. Wamsutta went, but on his way back he suddenly fell sick, and soon after he reached home he died. His young wife was a woman who was thought a great deal of by her tribe, and she told them that she felt sure the white people had poisoned her husband in order to get rid of him. This was not true, but the Indians believed it.

[Footnote 1: Wamsutta (Wam-sut'ta).]

[Footnote 2: Massasoit: see paragraph 68.]

88. Philip becomes chief; why he hated the white men; how the white men had got possession of the Indian lands.—Philip now became chief. He called himself "King Philip." His palace was a wigwam made of bark. On great occasions he wore a bright red blanket and a kind of crown made of a broad belt ornamented with shells. King Philip hated the white people because, in the first place, he believed that they had murdered his brother; and next, because he saw that they were growing stronger in numbers every year, while the Indians were becoming weaker.



When the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth, Massasoit, Philip's father, held all the country from Cape Cod back to the eastern shores of Narragansett Bay; that is, a strip about thirty miles wide. The white settlers bought a small piece of this land. After a while they bought more, and so they kept on until in about fifty years they got nearly all of what Massasoit's tribe had once owned. The Indians had nothing left but two little necks of land, which were nearly surrounded by the waters of Narragansett Bay. Here they felt that they were shut up almost like prisoners, and that the white men watched everything that they did.

89. How King Philip felt; signs of the coming war; the "Praying Indians"; the murder.—King Philip was a very proud man—quite as proud, in fact, as the king of England. He could not bear to see his people losing power. He said to himself, if the Indians do not rise and drive out the white men, then the white men will certainly drive out the Indians. Most of the Indians now had guns, and could use them quite as well as the whites could; so Philip thought that it was best to fight.

The settlers felt that the war was coming. Some of them fancied that they saw the figure of an Indian bow in the clouds. Others said that they heard sounds like guns fired off in the air, and horsemen riding furiously up and down in the sky, as if getting ready for battle.

But though many Indians now hated the white settlers, this was not true of all. A minister, named John Eliot, had persuaded some of the red men near Boston to give up their religion, and to try to live like the white people. These were called "Praying Indians." One of them who knew King Philip well told the settlers that Philip's warriors were grinding their hatchets sharp for war. Soon after, this "Praying Indian" was found murdered. The white people accused three of Philip's men of having killed him. They were tried, found guilty, and hanged.

90. Beginning of the war at Swansea;[3] burning of Brookfield.—Then Philip's warriors began the war in the summer of 1675. Some white settlers were going home from church in the town of Swansea, Massachusetts; they had been to pray that there might be no fighting. As they walked along, talking together, two guns were fired out of the bushes. One of the white men fell dead in the road, and another was badly hurt.



The shots were fired by Indians. This was the way they always fought when they could. They were not cowards, but they did not come out boldly, but would fire from behind trees and rocks. Often a white man would be killed without even seeing who shot him.

At first the fighting was mainly in those villages of Plymouth Colony which were nearest Narragansett Bay; then it spread to the valley of the Connecticut River and the neighborhood. Deerfield, Springfield, Brookfield,[4] Groton,[5] and many other places in Massachusetts were attacked. The Indians would creep up stealthily in the night, burn the houses, carry off the women and children prisoners if they could, kill the rest of the inhabitants, take their scalps home and hang them up in their wigwams.



At Brookfield the settlers left their houses, and gathered in one strong house for defence. The Indians burned all the houses but that one, and did their best to burn that, too. They dipped rags in brimstone, such as we make matches of, fastened them to the points of their arrows, set fire to them, and then shot the blazing arrows into the shingles of the roof. When the Indians saw that the shingles had caught, and were beginning to flame up, they danced for joy, and roared like wild bulls. But the men in the house managed to put out the fire on the roof. Then the savages got a cart, filled it with hay, set it on fire, and pushed it up against the house. This time they thought that they should certainly burn the white people out; but just then a heavy shower came up, and put out the fire. A little later, some white soldiers marched into the village, and saved the people in the house.

[Footnote 3: Swansea (Swon'ze).]

[Footnote 4: See map in this paragraph.]

[Footnote 5: Groton (Graw'ton).]

91. The fight at Hadley; what Colonel[6] Goffe[7] did.—At Hadley, the people were in the meeting-house when the terrible Indian war-whoop[8] rang through the village. The savages drove back those who dared to go out against them, and it seemed as if the village must be destroyed. Suddenly a white-haired old man, sword in hand, appeared among the settlers. No one knew who he was; but he called to them to follow him, as a captain calls to his men, and they obeyed him. The astonished Indians turned and ran. When, after all was over, the whites looked for their brave leader, he had gone; they never saw him again. Many thought that he was an angel who had been sent to save them. But the angel was Colonel Goffe, an Englishman, who was one of the judges who had sentenced King Charles the First to death during a great war in England. He had escaped to America; and, luckily for the people of Hadley, he was hiding in the house of a friend in that village when the Indians attacked it.



[Footnote 6: Colonel (kur'nel): the chief officer of a regiment of soldiers.]

[Footnote 7: Goffe (Gof): and see List of Books at the end of this book.]

[Footnote 8: War-whoop (war-hoop): a very loud, shrill cry made by the Indians when engaged in war, or as a shout of alarm.]

92. How a woman drove off an Indian.—In this dreadful war with the savages there were times when even the women had to fight for their lives. In one case, a woman had been left in a house with two young children. She heard a noise at the window, and looking up, saw an Indian trying to raise the sash. Quick as thought, she clapped the two little children under two large brass kettles which stood near. Then, seizing a shovel-full of red-hot coals from the open fire, she stood ready, and just as the Indian thrust his head into the room, she dashed the coals right into his face and eyes. With a yell of agony the Indian let go his hold, dropped to the ground as though he had been shot, and ran howling to the woods.



93. The great swamp fight; burning the Indian wigwams; what the Chief Canonchet[9] said.—During the summer and autumn of 1675 the Indians on the west side of Narragansett Bay[10]took no open part in King Philip's War. But the next winter the white people found that these Indians were secretly receiving and sheltering the savages who had been wounded in fighting for that noted chief. For that reason, the settlers determined to raise a large force and attack them. The Indians had gathered in a fort on an island in a swamp. This fort was a very difficult place to reach. It was built of the trunks of trees set upright in the ground. It was so strong that the savages felt quite safe.

Starting very early in the morning, the attacking party waded fifteen miles through deep snow. Many of them had their hands and feet badly frozen. One of the chief men in leading the attack was Captain Benjamin Church of Plymouth; he was a very brave soldier, and knew all about Indian life and Indian fighting. In the battle, he was struck by two bullets, and so badly wounded that he could not move a step further; but he made one of his men hold him up, and he shouted to his soldiers to go ahead. The fight was a desperate one, but at length the fort was taken. The attacking party lost more than two hundred and fifty men in killed and wounded; the Indians lost as many as a thousand.

After the battle was over, Captain Church begged the men not to burn the wigwams inside the fort, for there were a great number of old men and women and little Indian children in the wigwams. But the men were very mad against the savages, and would not listen to him. They set the wigwams on fire, and burned many of these poor creatures to death.

Canonchet, the chief of the tribe, was taken prisoner. The settlers told him they would spare his life if he would try to make peace. "No," said he, "we will all fight to the last man rather than become slaves to the white men." He was then told that he must be shot. "I like it well," said he. "I wish to die before my heart becomes soft, or I say anything unworthy of myself."

[Footnote 9: Canonchet (Ka-non'chet).]

[Footnote 10: See map in paragraph 90.]

94. Philip's wife and son are taken prisoners; Philip is shot; end of the war.—The next summer Captain Church, with a lot of "brisk Bridgewater lads" chased King Philip and his men, and took many of the Indians prisoners. Among those then taken captive were King Philip's wife and his little boy. When Philip heard of it, he cried out, "My heart breaks; now I am ready to die." He had good reason for saying so. It was the custom in England to sell such prisoners of war as slaves. Following this custom, the settlers here took this boy, the grandson of that Massasoit[11] who had helped them when they were poor and weak, and sold him with his mother. They were sent to the Bermuda Islands,[12] and there worked to death under the hot sun and the lash of the slave-driver's whip.

Not long after that, King Philip himself was shot. He had been hunted like a wild beast from place to place. At last he had come back to see his old home at Mount Hope[13] once more. There Captain Church found him; there the Indian warrior was shot. His head and hands were cut off,—as was then done in England in such cases,—and his head was carried to Plymouth and set up on a pole. It stood there twenty years.

King Philip's death brought the war to an end. It had lasted a little over a year; that is, from the early summer of 1675 to the latter part of the summer of 1676. In that short time the Indians had killed between five and six hundred white settlers, and had burned thirteen villages to ashes, besides partly burning a great many more. The war cost so much money that many people were made poor by it; but the strength of the Indians was broken, and they never dared to trouble the people of Southern New England again.

[Footnote 11: See paragraph 68.]

[Footnote 12: Bermuda (Ber-mu'dah): the Bermuda Islands are in the Atlantic, north of the West India Islands and east of South Carolina; they belong to Great Britain.]

[Footnote 13: See map in paragraph 84.]

95. Summary.—In 1675 King Philip began a great Indian war against the people of Southeastern New England. His object was to kill off the white settlers, and get back the land for the Indians. He did kill a large number, and he destroyed many villages, but in the end the white men gained the victory. Philip's wife and child were sold as slaves, and he was shot. The Indians never attempted another war in this part of the country.

Who was Wamsutta? What happened to him? Who was "King Philip"? Why did he hate the white men? What did he say to himself? What is said about the "Praying Indians"? What happened to one of them? What was done with three of Philip's men? Where and how did the war begin? To what part of the country did it spread? Tell about the Indian attack on Brookfield. What happened at Hadley? Tell how a woman drove off an Indian. Tell all you can about the Great Swamp Fight. What is said about Canonchet? What is said of King Philip's wife and son? What happened to King Philip himself? What is said about the war?



WILLIAM PENN (1644-1718).

96. King Charles the Second gives William Penn a great piece of land, and names it Pennsylvania.—King Charles the Second of England owed a large sum of money to a young Englishman named William Penn. The king was fond of pleasure, and he spent so much money on himself and his friends that he had none left to pay his just debts. Penn knew this; so he told His Majesty that if he would give him a piece of wild land in America, he would ask nothing more.



Charles was very glad to settle the account so easily. He therefore gave Penn a great territory[1] north of Maryland[2] and west of the Delaware River. This territory was nearly as large as England. The king named it Pennsylvania, a word which means Penn's Woods. At that time the land was not thought to be worth much. No one then had discovered the fact that beneath Penn's Woods there were immense mines of coal and iron, which would one day be of greater value than all the riches of the king of England.

[Footnote 1: Territory: any very large extent of land.]

[Footnote 2: See map in paragraph 97.]

97. William Penn's religion; what he wanted to do with his American land.—Penn belonged to a religious society called the Society of Friends; to-day they are generally spoken of as Quakers. They are a people who try to find out what is right by asking their own hearts. They believe in showing no more signs of respect to one man than to another, and at that time they would not take off their hats even to the king himself.



Penn wanted the land which had been given him here as a place where the Friends or Quakers might go and settle. A little later the whole of what is now the state of New Jersey was bought by Penn and other Quakers for the same purpose. We have seen[3] that neither the Pilgrims nor the Catholics had any real peace in England. The Quakers suffered even more still; for oftentimes they were cruelly whipped, thrown into dark and dirty prisons where many died of the bad treatment they received. William Penn himself had been shut up in jail four times on account of his religion; and though he was no longer in such danger, because the king was his friend, yet he wanted to provide a safe place for others who were not so well off as he was.

[Footnote 3: See paragraphs 62 and 76.]

98. Penn sends out emigrants to Pennsylvania; he gets ready to go himself; his conversation with the king.—Penn accordingly sent out a number of people who were anxious to settle in Pennsylvania. The next year, 1682, he made ready to sail, himself with a hundred more emigrants. Just before he started, he called on the king in his palace in London. The king was fond of joking, and he said to him that he should never expect to see him again, for he thought that the Indians would be sure to catch such a good-looking young man as Penn was and eat him. 'But, Friend Charles,' said Penn, 'I mean to buy the land of the Indians, so they will rather keep on good terms with me than eat me.' 'Buy their lands!' exclaimed the king. 'Why, is not the whole of America mine?' 'Certainly not,' answered Penn. 'What!' replied the king; 'didn't my people discover it?[4] and so haven't I the right to it?' 'Well, Friend Charles,' said Penn, 'suppose a canoe full of Indians should cross the sea and should discover England, would that make it theirs? Would you give up the country to them?' The king did not know what to say to this; it was a new way of looking at the matter. He probably said to himself, These Quakers are a strange people; they seem to think that even American savages have rights which should be respected.

[Footnote 4: Referring to the discovery of the American continent by the Cabots, sent out by Henry the Seventh of England, see paragraph 22.]

99. Penn founds[5] the city of Philadelphia; his treaty[6] with the Indians; his visit to them; how the Indians and the Quakers got on together.—When William Penn reached America, in 1682, he sailed up the broad and beautiful Delaware River for nearly twenty miles. There he stopped, and resolved to build a city on its banks. He gave the place the Bible name of Philadelphia,[7] or the City of Brotherly Love, because he hoped that all of its citizens would live together like brothers. The streets were named from the trees then growing on the land, and so to-day many are still called Walnut, Pine, Cedar, Vine, and so on.

Penn said, "We intend to sit down lovingly among the Indians." On that account, he held a great meeting with them under a wide-spreading elm. The tree stood in what is now a part of Philadelphia. Here Penn and the red men made a treaty or agreement by which they promised each other that they would live together as friends as long as the water should run in the rivers, or the sun shine in the sky.



Nearly a hundred years later, while the Revolutionary War was going on, the British army took possession of the city. It was cold, winter weather, and the men wanted fire-wood; but the English general thought so much of William Penn that he set a guard of soldiers round the great elm, to prevent any one from chopping it down.

Not long after the great meeting under the elm, Penn visited some of the savages in their wigwams. They treated him to a dinner—or shall we say a lunch?—of roasted acorns. After their feast, some of the young savages began to run and leap about, to show the Englishman what they could do. When Penn was in college at Oxford he had been fond of doing such things himself. The sight of the Indian boys made him feel like a boy again; so he sprang up from the ground, and beat them all at hop, skip, and jump. This completely won the hearts of the red men.



From that time, for sixty years, the Pennsylvania settlers and the Indians were fast friends. The Indians said, "The Quakers are honest men; they do no harm; they are welcome to come here." In New England there had been, as we have seen,[8] a terrible war with the savages, but in Pennsylvania, no Indian ever shed a drop of Quaker blood.

[Footnote 5: Founds: begins to build.]

[Footnote 6: Treaty: an agreement; and see paragraph 69.]

[Footnote 7: See Rev. i. 11 and iii. 7.]

[Footnote 8: See paragraph 90.]

100. How Philadelphia grew; what was done there in the Revolution; William Penn's last years and death.—Philadelphia grew quite fast. William Penn let the people have land very cheap, and he said to them, "You shall be governed by laws of your own making." Even after Philadelphia became quite a good-sized town, it had no poor-house, for none was needed; everybody seemed to be able to take care of himself.

When the Revolution began, the people of Pennsylvania and of the country north and south of it sent men to Philadelphia to decide what should be done. This meeting was called the Congress. It was held in the old State House, a building which is still standing, and in 1776 Congress declared the United States of America independent of England. In the war, the people of Delaware and New Jersey fought side by side with those of Pennsylvania.

William Penn spent a great deal of money in helping Philadelphia and other settlements. After he returned to England he was put in prison for debt by a rascally fellow he had employed. He did not owe the money, and proved that the man who said that he did was no better than a thief. Penn was released from prison; but his long confinement in jail had broken his health down. When he died, the Indians of Pennsylvania sent his widow some beautiful furs, in remembrance of their "Brother Penn," as they called him. They said that the furs were to make her a cloak, "to protect her while passing through this thorny wilderness without her guide."



About twenty-five miles west of London, on a country road within sight of the towers of Windsor Castle,[9] there stands a Friends' meeting-house, or Quaker church. In the yard back of the meeting-house William Penn lies buried. For a hundred years or more there was no mark of any kind to show where he rests; but now a small stone bearing his name points out the grave of the founder of the great state of Pennsylvania.

[Footnote 9: Windsor Castle: see paragraph 77.]

101. Summary.—Charles the Second, king of England, owed William Penn, a young English Quaker, a large sum of money. In order to settle the debt, the king gave him a great piece of land in America, and named it Pennsylvania, or Penn's Woods. Penn wished to make a home for Quakers in America; and in 1682 he came over, and began building the city of Philadelphia. When the Revolution broke out, men were sent from all parts of the country to Philadelphia, to hold a meeting called the Congress. In 1776, Congress declared the United States independent.

To whom did King Charles the Second owe a large sum of money? How did he pay his debt? What did the king name the country? What does the name mean? What has been found there? What is said about the Friends or Quakers? What did Penn want the land here for? How were the Quakers then treated in England? What did Penn do in 1682? Tell what the king said to Penn and what Penn replied. What city did Penn begin to build here? What does Philadelphia mean? What did Penn and the Indians do? What did the English general do about the great elm in the Revolution? Tell about Penn's dinner with the Indians. Did the Indians trouble the Quakers? What is said of the growth of Philadelphia? What was done there in the Revolution? Tell what you can about Penn's last days. Where is he buried?



GENERAL JAMES OGLETHORPE[1] (1696-1785).

102. The twelve English colonies in America; General Oglethorpe makes a settlement in Georgia.—We have seen[2] that the first real colony or settlement made in America by the English was in Virginia in 1607. By the beginning of 1733, or in about a hundred and twenty-five years, eleven more had been made, or twelve in all. They stretched along the seacoast, from the farthest coast of Maine to the northern boundary of Florida, which was then owned by the Spaniards.[3]

The two colonies farthest south were North Carolina and South Carolina. In 1733 James Oglethorpe, a brave English soldier, who afterward became General Oglethorpe, came over here to make a new settlement. This new one, which made just thirteen[4] in all, was called Georgia in honor of King George the Second, who gave a piece of land for it, on the seacoast, below South Carolina.



[Footnote 1: Oglethorpe (O'gel-thorp).]

[Footnote 2: See paragraph 37.]

[Footnote 3: Because the Spaniards had settled it in 1565; see paragraph 30.]

[Footnote 4: These thirteen colonies or settlements were: First, the four New England colonies (New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode island; Maine was then part of Massachusetts, and Vermont was claimed by both New Hampshire and New York). Secondly, four middle colonies (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, with Delaware). Thirdly, five southern colonies (Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia).]

103. What it was that led General Oglethorpe to make this new settlement.—General Oglethorpe had a friend in England who was cast into prison for debt. There the unfortunate man was so cruelly treated that he fell sick and died, leaving his family in great distress.

The General felt the death of his friend so much that he set to work to find out how other poor debtors lived in the London prisons. He soon saw that great numbers of them suffered terribly. The prisons were crowded and filthy. The men shut up in them were ragged and dirty; some of them were fastened with heavy chains, and a good many actually died of starvation.

General Oglethorpe could not bear to see strong men killed off in this manner. He thought that if the best of them—those who were honest and willing to work—could have the chance given them of earning their living, that they would soon do as well as any men. It was to help them that he persuaded the king to give the land of Georgia.

104. Building the city of Savannah; what the people of Charleston, South Carolina, did; a busy settlement; the alligators.—General Oglethorpe took over thirty-five families to America in 1733. They settled on a high bank of the Savannah[5] River, about twenty miles from the sea. The general laid out a town with broad, straight, handsome streets, and with many small squares or parks. He called the settlement Savannah from the Indian name of the river on which it stands.



The people of Charleston, South Carolina, were glad to have some English neighbors south of them that would help them fight the Spaniards of Florida, who hated the English, and wanted to drive them out. They gave the newcomers a hundred head of cattle, a drove of hogs, and twenty barrels of rice.

The emigrants set to work with a will, cutting down the forest trees, building houses, and planting gardens. There were no idlers to be seen at Savannah: even the children found something to do that was helpful.

Nothing disturbed the people but the alligators. They climbed up the bank from the river to see what was going on. But the boys soon taught them not to be too curious. When one monster was found impudently prowling round the town, they thumped him with sticks till they fairly beat the life out of him. After that, the alligators paid no more visits to the settlers.

[Footnote 5: Savannah (Sa-van'ah).]

105. Arrival of some German emigrants; "Ebenezer";[6] "blazing" trees.—After a time, some German Protestants, who had been cruelly driven out of their native land on account of their religion, came to Georgia. General Oglethorpe gave them a hearty welcome. He had bought land of the Indians, and so there was plenty of room for all. The Germans went up the river, and then went back a number of miles into the woods; there they picked out a place for a town. They called their settlement by the Bible name of Ebenezer,[7] which means "The Lord hath helped us."

There were no roads through the forests, so the new settlers "blazed" the trees; that is, they chopped a piece of bark off, so that they could find their way through the thick woods when they wanted to go to Savannah. Every tree so marked stood like a guide-post; it showed the traveller which way to go until he came in sight of the next one.



[Footnote 6: Ebenezer (Eb-e-ne'zer).]

[Footnote 7: See I Sam. vii. 12.]

106. Trying to make silk; the queen's American dress.—The settlers hoped to be able to get large quantities of silk to send to England, because the mulberry-tree grows wild in Georgia, and its leaves are the favorite food of the silkworm.[8] At first it seemed as if the plan would be successful, and General Oglethorpe took over some Georgia silk as a present to the queen of England. She had a handsome dress made of it for her birthday; it was the first American silk dress ever worn by an English queen. But after a while it was found that silk could not be produced in Georgia as well as it could in Italy and France, and so in time cotton came to be raised instead.

[Footnote 8: Silkworm: a kind of caterpillar which spins a fine, soft thread of which silk is made.]

107. Keeping out the Spaniards; Georgia powder at Bunker Hill; General Oglethorpe in his old age.—The people of Georgia did a good work in keeping out the Spaniards, who were trying to get possession of the part of the country north of Florida. Later, like the settlers in North Carolina and South Carolina, they did their part in helping to make America independent of the rule of the king of England. When the war of the Revolution began, the king had a lot of powder stored in Savannah. The people broke into the building, rolled out the kegs, and carried them off. Part of the powder they kept for themselves, and part they seem to have sent to Massachusetts; so that it is quite likely that the men who fought at Bunker Hill may have loaded their guns with some of the powder given them by their friends in Savannah. In that case the king got it back, but in a somewhat different way from what he expected.

General Oglethorpe spent the last of his life in England. He lived to a very great age. Up to the last he had eyes as bright and keen as a boy's. After the Revolution was over, the king made a treaty or agreement, by which he promised to let the United States of America live in peace. General Oglethorpe was able to read that treaty without spectacles. He had lived to see the colony of Georgia which he had settled become a free and independent state.

108. Summary.—In 1733 General James Oglethorpe brought over a number of emigrants from England, and settled Savannah, Georgia. Georgia was the thirteenth English colony; it was the last one established in this country. General Oglethorpe lived to see it become one of the United States of America.

At the beginning of 1733 how many English colonies were there in America? Who was General Oglethorpe? What did he do? Why was the new settlement called Georgia? Tell what happened to a friend of General Oglethorpe's. What did he wish to do for the poor debtors? What is said about the settlement of Savannah? What about the German emigrants and Ebenezer? What about raising silk? What good work did the people of Georgia do? What about Georgia powder in the Revolution? What is said of General Oglethorpe in old age?



BENJAMIN FRANKLIN (1706-1790).

109. Growth of Philadelphia; what a young printer was doing for it.—By the year 1733, when the people of Savannah[1] were building their first log cabins, Philadelphia[2] had grown to be the largest city in this country,—though it would take more than seventy such cities to make one as great as Philadelphia now is.

Next to William Penn,[3] the person who did the most for Philadelphia was a young man who had gone from Boston to make his home among the Quakers. He lived in a small house near the market. On a board over the door he had painted his name and business; here it is:



[Footnote 1: See paragraph 104.]

[Footnote 2: See paragraph 99.]

[Footnote 3: See paragraph 96.]

110. Franklin's newspaper and almanac;[4] how he worked; standing before kings.—Franklin was then publishing a small newspaper, called the Pennsylvania Gazette.[5] To-day we print newspapers by steam at the rate of two or three hundred a minute; but Franklin, standing in his shirtsleeves at a little press, printed his with his own hands. It was hard work, as you could see by the drops of sweat that stood on his forehead; and it was slow as well as hard. The young man not only wrote himself most of what he printed in his paper, but he often made his own ink; sometimes he even made his own type.[6] When he got out of paper he would take a wheelbarrow, go out and buy a load, and wheel it home. To-day there are more than three hundred newspapers printed in Philadelphia; then there were only two, and Franklin's was the better of those two.



Besides this paper he published an almanac, which thousands of people bought. In it he printed such sayings as these: "He who would thrive[7] must rise at five," and "If you want a thing well done, do it yourself." But Franklin was not contented with simply printing these sayings, for he practised them as well.

Sometimes his friends would ask him why he began work so early in the morning, and kept at it so many hours. He would laugh, and tell them that his father used to repeat to him this saying of Solomon's: "Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men."[8]

At that time the young printer never actually expected to stand in the presence of a king, but years later he met with five; and one of them, his friend the king of France, gave him his picture set round with diamonds.

[Footnote 4: Almanac (al'ma-nak).]

[Footnote 5: Gazette (ga-zet'): a newspaper.]

[Footnote 6: Type: the raised metal letters used in printing are made by melting lead and some other metals together and pouring the mixture into molds.]

[Footnote 7: Thrive: to get on in business, to prosper.]

[Footnote 8: See Prov. xxii. 29.]

111. Franklin's boyhood; making tallow candles; he is apprenticed[9] to his brother; how he managed to save money to buy books.—Franklin's father was a poor man with a large family. He lived in Boston, and made soap and candles. Benjamin went to school two years; then, when he was ten years old, his father set him to work in his factory, and he never went to school again. He was now kept busy filling the candle-molds with melted grease, cutting off the ends of the wicks, and running errands. But the boy did not like this kind of work; and, as he was very fond of books, his father put him in a printing-office. This office was carried on by James Franklin, one of Benjamin's brothers. James Franklin paid a small sum of money each week for Benjamin's board; but the boy told him that if he would let him have half the money to use as he liked, he would board himself. James was glad to do this. Benjamin then gave up eating meat, and, while the others went out to dinner, he would stay in the printing-office and eat a boiled potato, or perhaps a handful of raisins. In this way, he saved up a number of coppers every week; and when he got enough laid by, he would buy a book.

But James Franklin was not only a mean man, but a hot-tempered one; and when he got angry with his young apprentice,[10] he would beat and knock him about. At length the lad, who was now seventeen, made up his mind that he would run away, and go to New York.

[Footnote 9: Apprenticed: bound by a written agreement to learn a trade of a master, who is bound by the same agreement to teach the trade.]

[Footnote 10: Apprentice: one who is apprenticed to a master to learn a trade. See footnote 9.]

112. Young Franklin runs away; he goes to New York, and then to Philadelphia.—Young Franklin sold some of his books, and with the money paid his passage to New York by a sailing-vessel—for in those days there were no steamboats or railroads in America. When he got to New York, he could not find work, so he decided to go on to Philadelphia.

He started to walk across New Jersey to Burlington, on the Delaware River, a distance of about fifty miles; there he hoped to get a sail-boat going down the river to Philadelphia. Shortly after he set out, it began to rain hard, and the lad was soon wet to the skin and splashed all over with red mud; but he kept on until noon, then took a rest, and on the third day he reached Burlington and got passage down the river.



113. Franklin's Sunday walk in Philadelphia; the rolls; Miss Read; the Quaker meeting-house.—Franklin landed in Philadelphia on Sunday morning (1723). He was tired and hungry; he had but a single dollar in the world. As he walked along, he saw a bake-shop open. He went in and bought three great, puffy rolls for a penny[11] each. Then he started up Market Street, where he was one day to have his newspaper office. He had a roll like a small loaf of bread tucked under each arm, and he was eating the other as though it tasted good to him. As he passed a house, he noticed a nice-looking young woman at the door. She seemed to want to laugh; and well she might, for Franklin appeared like a youthful tramp who had been robbing a baker's shop. The young woman was Miss Deborah[12] Read. A number of years later Franklin married her. He always said that he could not have got a better wife.



Franklin kept on in his walk until he came to the Delaware. He took a hearty drink of river water to settle his breakfast, and then gave away the two rolls he had under his arm to a poor woman with a child. On his way back from the river he followed a number of people to a Quaker meeting-house. At the meeting no one spoke. Franklin was tired out, and, not having any preacher to keep him awake, he soon fell asleep, and slept till the meeting was over. He says, "This was the first house I was in, or slept in, in Philadelphia."

[Footnote 11: Penny: an English coin worth two cents.]

[Footnote 12: Deborah (Deb'o-rah).]

114. Franklin finds work; he goes back to Boston on a visit; he learns to stoop.—The next day the young man found some work in a printing-office. Six months afterward he decided to go back to Boston to see his friends. He started on his journey with a good suit of clothes, a silver watch, and a well-filled purse.

While in Boston, Franklin went to call on a minister who had written a little book[13] which he had been very fond of reading. As he was coming away from the minister's house, he had to go through a low passage-way under a large beam. "Stoop! Stoop!" cried out the gentleman; but Franklin did not understand him, and so hit his head a sharp knock against the beam. "Ah," said his friend, as he saw him rubbing his head, "you are young, and have the world before you; stoop as you go through it, and you will miss many hard thumps." Franklin says that this sensible advice, which was thus beat into his head, was of great use afterward; in fact, he learned then how to stoop to conquer.



[Footnote 13: The name of this book, written by the Rev. Cotton Mather, was Essays to do Good.]

115. Franklin returns to Philadelphia; he goes to London; water against beer.—Franklin soon went back to Philadelphia. The governor of Pennsylvania then persuaded him to go to London, telling him that he would help him to get a printing-press and type to start a newspaper in Philadelphia.

When Franklin reached London, he found that the governor was one of those men who promise great things, but do nothing. Instead of buying a press, he had to go to work in a printing-office to earn his bread. He stayed in London more than a year. At the office where he worked the men were great beer-drinkers. One of his companions bought six pints a day. He began with a pint before breakfast, then took another pint at breakfast, then a pint between breakfast and dinner, then a pint at dinner, then a pint in the afternoon, and, last of all, a pint after he had done work. Franklin drank nothing but water. The others laughed at him, and nicknamed him the "Water-American"; but after a while they had to confess that he was stronger than they were who drank so much strong beer.

The fact was that Franklin could beat them both at work and at play. When they went out for a bath in the Thames,[14] they found that their "Water-American" could swim like a fish; and he so astonished them that a rich Londoner tried to persuade him to start a swimming-school to teach his sons, but Franklin had stayed in England long enough, and he now decided to go back to Philadelphia.

[Footnote 14: Thames (Tems). London is on the river Thames.]

116. Franklin sets up his newspaper; "sawdust pudding."—After his return to America, Franklin labored so diligently that he was soon able to set up a newspaper of his own. He tried to make it a good one. But some people thought that he spoke his mind too freely. They complained of this to him, and gave him to understand that if he did not make his paper to please them, they would stop taking it or advertising in it.

Franklin heard what they had to say, and then invited them all to come and have supper with him. They went, expecting a feast, but they found nothing on the table but two dishes of corn-meal mush and a big pitcher of cold water. That kind of mush was then eaten only by very poor people; and because it was yellow and coarse, it was nicknamed "sawdust pudding."



Franklin gave everybody a heaping plateful, and then, filling his own, he made a hearty supper of it. The others tried to eat, but could not. After Franklin had finished his supper, he looked up, and said quietly, "My friends, any one who can live on 'sawdust pudding' and cold water, as I can, does not need much help from others." After that, no one went to the young printer with complaints about his paper. Franklin, as we have seen,[15] had learned to stoop; but he certainly did not mean to go stooping through life.

[Footnote 15: See paragraph 114.]

117. Franklin's plan of life; what he did for Philadelphia.—Not many young men can see their own faults, but Franklin could. More than that, he tried hard to get rid of them. He kept a little book in which he wrote down his faults. If he wasted half an hour of time or a shilling of money, or said anything that he had better not have said, he wrote it down in his book. He carried that book in his pocket all his life, and he studied it as a boy at school studies a hard lesson. By it he learned three things,—first, to do the right thing; next, to do it at the right time; last of all, to do it in the right way.

As he was never tired of helping himself to get upward and onward, so, too, he was never tired of helping others. He started the first public library in Philadelphia, which was also the first in America. He set on foot the first fire-engine company and the first military company in that city. He got the people to pave the muddy streets with stone; he helped to build the first academy,—now called the University of Pennsylvania,—and he also helped to build the first hospital.

118. Franklin's experiments[16] with electricity; the wonderful bottle; the picture of the king of England.—While doing these things and publishing his paper besides, Franklin found time to make experiments with electricity. Very little was then known about this wonderful power, but a Dutchman, living in the city of Leyden[17] in Holland, had discovered a way of bottling it up in what is called a Leyden Jar. Franklin had one of these jars, and he was never tired of seeing what new and strange thing he could do with it.

He contrived a picture of the king of England with a movable gilt crown on his head. Then he connected the crown by a long wire with the Leyden Jar. When he wanted some fun he would dare any one to go up to the picture and take off the king's crown. Why that's easy enough, a man would say, and would walk up and seize the crown. But no sooner had he touched it than he would get an electric shock which would make his fingers tingle as they never tingled before. With a loud Oh! Oh! he would let go of the crown, and start back in utter astonishment, not knowing what had hurt him.



[Footnote 16: Experiments: here an experiment is a trial made to discover something unknown. Franklin made these experiments or trials with electricity and with thunder clouds in order to find out what he could about them.]

[Footnote 17: Leyden: see map in paragraph 62.]

119. The electrical kite.—But Franklin's greatest experiment was made one day in sober earnest with a kite. He believed that the electricity in the bottle, or Leyden Jar, was the same thing as the lightning we see in a thunder-storm. He knew well enough how to get an electric spark from the jar, for he had once killed a turkey with it for dinner; but how could he get a spark from a cloud in the sky?

He thought about it for a long time; then he made a kite out of a silk handkerchief, and fastened a sharp iron point to the upright stick of the kite. One day, when a thunder-storm was seen coming up, Franklin and his son went out to the fields. The kite was raised; then Franklin tied an iron key to the lower end of the string. After waiting some time, he saw the little hair-like threads of the string begin to stand up like the bristles of a brush. He felt certain that the electricity was coming down the string. He put his knuckle close to the key, and a spark flew out. Next, he took his Leyden Jar and collected the electricity in that. He had made two great discoveries, for he had found out that electricity and lightning are the same thing and he had also found how to fill his bottle directly from the clouds: that was something that no one had ever done before.



120. Franklin invents the lightning-rod; Doctor Franklin.—But Franklin did not stop at that. He said, If I can draw down electricity from the sky with a kite-string, I can draw it still better with a tall, sharp-pointed iron rod. He put up such a rod on his house in Philadelphia; it was the first lightning-rod in the world. Soon other people began to put them up: so this was another gift of his to the city which he loved. Every good lightning-rod which has since been erected to protect buildings has been a copy of that invented by Franklin.

People now began to talk, not only in this country but in Europe, about his electrical experiments and discoveries. The oldest college in Scotland[18] gave him a title of honor and called him Doctor—a word which means a learned man. From this time, Franklin the printer was no longer plain Mr. Franklin, but Dr. Franklin.

Dr. Franklin did not think that he had found out all that could be found out about electricity; he believed that he had simply made a beginning, and that other men would discover still greater things that could be done with it. Do you think he was mistaken about that?

[Footnote 18: The University of St. Andrews.]

121. Franklin in the Revolutionary War; Franklin and the map of the United States.—When the war of the Revolution broke out, Dr. Franklin did a great work for his country. He did not fight battles like Washington, but he did something just as useful. First, he helped write the Declaration of Independence, by which we declared ourselves free from the rule of the king of England; next, he went to France to get aid for us. We were then too poor to pay our soldiers; he got the king of France to let us have money to give them.



Franklin lived to see the Revolution ended and America free. When he died, full of years and of honors, he was buried in Philadelphia. Twenty thousand people went to his funeral.



If you wish to see what the country thinks of him, you have only to look at a large map of the United States, and count up how many times you find his name on it. You will find that more than two hundred counties and towns are called FRANKLIN.

122. Summary.—Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston nearly two hundred years ago. He went to Philadelphia when he was seventeen. He started a newspaper there, opened the first public library, and did many other things to help the city. He discovered that lightning and electricity are the same thing, and he invented the lightning-rod to protect buildings. In the Revolution, he got large sums of money from the king of France to pay our soldiers and to help Washington fight the battles which ended in making America free.

What had Philadelphia grown to be by 1733? Who did a great deal for Philadelphia? Tell what you can about Franklin's newspaper. What else did he publish? What sayings did he print in his almanac? What saying of Solomon's did Franklin's father use to repeat to him? Did he ever stand in the presence of any kings? Tell what you can about Franklin as a boy. Where did he live? What did he do? How did he save money to buy books? Why did he run away? Where did he go? Tell what you can about Franklin's landing in Philadelphia? How did Franklin look to Miss Read? Where did Franklin find work? What happened to him when he went back to Boston on a visit? Why did Franklin go to London? What did he do there? What did they nickname him in the printing-office? What did Franklin do after he returned to Philadelphia? Tell the story of the "sawdust pudding." Tell about Franklin's plan of life. What did he do for Philadelphia? What experiments did Franklin make? What about the picture of the king? Tell the story of the kite. What two things did he find out by means of this kite? What did he invent? What title did a college in Scotland now give him? Did Franklin think that anything more would be discovered about electricity? What two things did Franklin do in the Revolution? What is said of his funeral? How many counties and towns in the United States are now called by his name?



GEORGE WASHINGTON (1732-1799).

123. A Virginia boy; what he became; what he learned at school; his writing-books.—In 1732, when Franklin was at work on his newspaper, a boy was born on a plantation[1] in Virginia who was one day to stand higher even than the Philadelphia printer.



That boy when he grew up was to be chosen leader of the armies of the Revolution; he was to be elected the first president of the United States; and before he died he was to be known and honored all over the world. The name of that boy was George Washington.

Washington's father died when George was only eleven years old, leaving him, with his brothers and sisters, to the care of a most excellent and sensible mother. It was that mother's influence more than anything else which made George the man he became.



George went to a little country school, where he learned to read, write, and cipher. By the time he was twelve, he could write a clear, bold hand. In one of his writing-books he copied many good rules or sayings. Here is one:—

]

[Footnote 1: Plantation: George Washington was born on a plantation (or large estate cultivated by slaves) on Bridges Creek, a small stream emptying into the Potomac. See map in paragraph 127. Not long after George's birth (February 22, 1732), his father moved to an estate on the Rappahannock River, opposite Fredericksburg. See map in paragraph 127 for this place and Mount Vernon.]

[Footnote 2: Celestial: heavenly, divine.]

124. Washington's sports and games; playing at war; "Captain George."—But young Washington was not always copying good sayings; for he was a tall, strong boy, fond of all out-door sports and games. He was a well-meaning boy, but he had a hot temper, and at times his blue eyes flashed fire. In all trials of strength and in all deeds of daring, George took the lead; he could run faster, jump further, and throw a stone higher than any one in the school.

When the boys played "soldier," they liked to have "Captain George" as commander. When he drew his wooden sword, and shouted Come on! they would all rush into battle with a wild hurrah. Years afterward, when the real war came, and George Washington drew his sword in earnest, some of his school companions may have fought under their old leader.

125. The great battle with the colt, and what came of it.—Once, however, Washington had a battle of a different kind. It was with a high-spirited colt which belonged to his mother. Nobody had ever been able to do anything with that colt, and most people were afraid of him. Early one morning, George and some of his brothers were out in the pasture. George looked at the colt prancing about and kicking up his heels. Then he said: "Boys, if you'll help me put a bridle on him, I'll ride him." The boys managed to get the colt into a corner and to slip on the bridle. With a leap, George seated himself firmly on his back. Then the fun began. The colt, wild with rage, ran, jumped, plunged, and reared straight up on his hind legs, hoping to throw his rider off. It was all useless; he might as well have tried to throw off his own skin, for the boy stuck to his back as though he had grown there. Then, making a last desperate bound into the air, the animal burst a blood-vessel and fell dead. The battle was over, George was victor, but it had cost the life of Mrs. Washington's favorite colt.



When the boys went in to breakfast, their mother, knowing that they had just come from the pasture, asked how the colt was getting on. "He is dead, madam," said George; "I killed him." "Dead!" exclaimed his mother. "Yes, madam, dead," replied her son. Then he told her just how it happened. When Mrs. Washington heard the story, her face flushed with anger. Then, waiting a moment, she looked steadily at George, and said quietly, "While I regret the loss of my favorite, I rejoice in my son, who always speaks the truth."

126. Washington goes on a visit to Mount Vernon; he makes the acquaintance of Lord Fairfax.—George's eldest brother, Lawrence Washington, had married the daughter of a gentleman named Fairfax,[3] who lived on the banks of the Potomac. Lawrence had a fine estate a few miles above, on the same river; he called his place Mount Vernon. When he was fourteen, George went to Mount Vernon to visit his brother.

Lawrence Washington took George down the river to call on the Fairfaxes. There the lad made the acquaintance of Lord Fairfax, an English nobleman who had come over from London. He owned an immense piece of land in Virginia. Lord Fairfax and George soon became great friends. He was a gray-haired man nearly sixty, but he enjoyed having this boy of fourteen as a companion. They spent weeks together on horseback in the fields and woods, hunting deer and foxes.

[Footnote 3: Fairfax. This was the Hon. William Fairfax; he was cousin to Lord Fairfax, and he had the care of Lord Fairfax's land.]

127. Lord Fairfax hires Washington to survey[4] his land; how Washington lived in the woods; the Indian war-dance.—Lord Fairfax's land extended westward more than a hundred miles. It had never been very carefully surveyed; and he was told that settlers were moving in beyond the Blue Ridge Mountains,[5] and were building log-cabins on his property without asking leave. By the time Washington was sixteen, he had learned surveying; and so Lord Fairfax hired him to measure his land for him. Washington was glad to undertake the work; for he needed the money, and he could earn in this way from five to ten dollars a day.



Early in the spring, Washington, in company with another young man, started off on foot to do this business. They crossed the Blue Ridge Mountains, and entered the Valley of Virginia, one of the most beautiful valleys in America.

The two young men would work all day in the woods with a long chain, measuring the land. When evening came, Washington would make a map of what they had measured. Then they would wrap themselves up in their blankets, stretch themselves on the ground at the foot of a tree, and go to sleep under the stars.

Every day they shot some game—squirrels or wild turkeys, or perhaps a deer. They kindled a fire with flint and steel,[6] and roasted the meat on sticks held over the coals. For plates they had clean chips; and as clean chips could always be got by a few blows with an axe, they never washed any dishes, but just threw them away, and had a new set for each meal.

While in the Valley they met a band of Indians, who stopped and danced a war-dance for them. The music was not remarkable,—for most of it was made by drumming on a deer-skin stretched across the top of an old iron pot,—but the dancing itself could not be beat. The savages leaped into the air, swung their hatchets, gashed the trees, and yelled till the woods rang.



When Washington returned from his surveying trip, Lord Fairfax was greatly pleased with his work; and the governor of Virginia made him one of the public surveyors. By this means he was able to get work which paid him handsomely.

[Footnote 4: Survey: to find out the form, size, and position of a piece of land by measuring it in certain ways.]

[Footnote 5: See map in this paragraph.]

[Footnote 6: Flint and steel: see picture in paragraph 84.]

128. Washington at the age of twenty-one; the French in the west; the governor of Virginia sends Washington to see the French commander.—By the time Washington was twenty-one he had grown to be over six feet in height. He was straight as an arrow and tough as a whip-lash. He had keen blue eyes that seemed to look into the very heart of things, and his fist was like a blacksmith's sledgehammer. He knew all about the woods, all about Indians, and he could take care of himself anywhere.

At this time the English settlers held the country along the seashore as far back as the Alleghany Mountains.[7] West of those mountains the French from Canada were trying to get possession of the land. They had made friends with many of the Indians, and they hoped, with their help, to be able to drive out the English and get the whole country for themselves.

In order to hold this land in the west, the French had built several forts[8] south of Lake Erie, and they were getting ready to build some on the Ohio River. The governor of Virginia was determined to put a stop to this. He had given young Washington the military title of major;[9] he now sent Major Washington to see the French commander at one of the forts near Lake Erie. Washington was to tell the Frenchman that he had built his forts on land belonging to the English, and that he and his men must either leave or fight.

Major Washington dressed himself like an Indian, and attended by several friendly Indians and by a white man named Gist,[10] who knew the country well, he set out on his journey through what was called the Great Woods.

The entire distance to the farthest fort and back was about a thousand miles. Washington could go on horseback part of the way, but there were no regular roads, and he had to climb mountains and swim rivers. After several weeks' travel he reached the fort, but the French commander refused to give up the land. He said that he and his men had come to stay, and that if the English did not like it, they must fight.

[Footnote 7: Alleghany (Al'le-ga'ni): see map in paragraph 127. (It is also spelled Allegheny.)]

[Footnote 8: Forts: see map in paragraph 127.]

[Footnote 9: Major (ma'jer): an officer in the army next above a captain, but below a colonel.]

[Footnote 10: Gist (Jist).]

129. The journey back; the Indian guide; how Washington found his way through the woods; the adventure with the raft.—On the way back, Washington had to leave his horses and come on foot with Gist and an Indian guide sent from the fort. This Indian guide was in the pay of the French, and he intended to murder Washington in the woods. One day he shot at him from behind a tree, but luckily did not hit him. Then Washington and Gist managed to get away from him, and set out to go back to Virginia by themselves. There were no paths through the thick forest; but Washington had his compass with him, and with that he could find his way just as the captain of a ship finds his at sea. When they reached the Alleghany River they found it full of floating ice. They worked all day and made a raft of logs. As they were pushing their way across with poles, Washington's pole was struck by a big piece of ice which he says jerked him out into water ten feet deep. At length the two men managed to get to a little island, but as there was no wood on it, they could not make a fire. The weather was bitterly cold, and Washington, who was soaked to the skin, had to take his choice between walking about all night, or trying to sleep on the frozen ground in his wet clothes.



130. Major Washington becomes Colonel Washington; Fort Necessity; Braddock's defeat.—When Major Washington got back to Virginia, the governor made him colonel. With a hundred and fifty men, Colonel Washington was ordered to set out for the west. He was to "make prisoners, kill or destroy," all Frenchmen who should try to get possession of land on the Ohio River. He built a small log fort, which he named Fort Necessity.[11] Here the French attacked him. They had five men to his one. Colonel Washington fought like a man who liked to hear the bullets whistle past his ears,—as he said he did,—but in the end he had to give up the fort.

Then General Braddock, a noted English soldier, was sent over to Virginia by the king to drive the French out of the country. He started with a fine army, and Washington went with him.[12] He told General Braddock that the French and the Indians would hide in the woods and fire at his men from behind trees. But Braddock paid no attention to the warning. On his way through the forest, the brave English general was suddenly struck down by the enemy, half of his army were killed or wounded, and the rest put to flight. Washington had two horses shot under him, and four bullets went through his coat. It was a narrow escape for the young man. One of those who fought in the battle said, "I expected every moment to see him fall"—but he was to live for greater work.



[Footnote 11: Fort Necessity: see map in paragraph 127.]

[Footnote 12: See map of Braddock's march in paragraph 127.]

131. End of the war with the French; what the king of England wanted to do; how the people here felt toward him.—The war with the French lasted a number of years. It ended by the English getting possession of the whole of America from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. All this part of America was ruled by George the Third, king of England. The king now determined to send over more soldiers, and keep them here to prevent the French in Canada from trying to get back the country they had lost. He wanted the people here in the thirteen colonies[13] to pay the cost of keeping these soldiers. But this the people were not willing to do, because they felt that they were able to protect themselves without help of any kind. Then the king said, If the Americans will not give the money, I will take it from them by force,—for pay it they must and shall. This was more than the king would have dared say about England; for there, if he wanted money to spend on his army, he had to ask the people for it, and they could give it or not as they thought best. The Americans said, We have the same rights as our brothers in England, and the king cannot force us to give a single copper against our will. If he tries to take it from us, we will fight. Some of the greatest men in England agreed with us, and said that they would fight, too, if they were in our place.

[Footnote 13: Thirteen colonies: see footnote 4 at the end of paragraph 102.]

132. The king determines to have the money; the tea-ships, and the "Boston tea-party."—But George the Third did not know the Americans, and he did not think that they meant what they said. He tried to make them pay the money, but they would not. From Maine to Georgia, all the people were of one mind. Then the king thought that he would try a different way. Shiploads of tea were sent over to New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Charleston, If the tea should be landed and sold, then every man who bought a pound of it would have to pay six cents more than the regular price. That six cents was a tax, and it went into the king's pocket. The people said, We won't pay that six cents. When the tea reached New York, the citizens sent it back again to England. They did the same thing at Philadelphia. At Charleston they let it be landed, but it was stored in damp cellars. People would not buy any of it any more than they would buy so much poison, so it all rotted and spoiled. At Boston they had a grand "tea-party." A number of men dressed themselves up like Indians, went on board the tea-ships at night, broke open all the chests, and emptied the tea into the harbor.



133. The king closes the port of Boston; Congress meets at Philadelphia; the names American and British; what General Gage tried to do.—The king was terribly angry; and orders were given that the port of Boston should be closed, so that no ships, except the king's war-ships, should come in or go out. Nearly all trade stopped in Boston. Many of the inhabitants began to suffer for want of food, but throughout the colonies the people tried their best to help them. The New England towns sent droves of sheep and cattle, New York sent wheat, South Carolina gave two hundred barrels of rice; the other colonies gave liberally in money and provisions. Even in England much sympathy was felt for the distressed people of Boston, and in London a large sum of money was raised to help those whom the king was determined to starve into submission.

The colonies now sent some of their best men to Philadelphia to consider what should be done. As this meeting was made up of those who had come from all parts of the country, it took the name of the General or Continental Congress.[14]

About this time, too, a great change took place; for the people throughout the country began to call themselves Americans, and to speak of the English troops that the king sent over here as British soldiers.

In Boston General Gage had command of these soldiers. He knew that the Americans were getting ready to fight, and that they had stored up powder and ball at Concord,[15] about twenty miles from Boston. One night he secretly sent out a lot of soldiers to march to Concord and destroy what they found there.

[Footnote 14: Congress: this word means a meeting or assembly of persons. The General or Continental Congress was an assembly of certain persons sent usually by all of the thirteen American colonies to meet at Philadelphia or Baltimore, to decide what should be done by the whole country. The first Congress met in 1774, or shortly before the Revolution began, and after that from time to time until near the close of the Revolution.]

[Footnote 15: Concord (Con'cord).]

134. Paul Revere;[16] the fight at Lexington and Concord; Bunker Hill.—But Paul Revere, a Boston man, was on the watch; and as soon as he found out which way the British were going, he set off at a gallop for Lexington, on the road to Concord. All the way out, he roused people from their sleep, with the cry, "The British are coming!"



When the king's soldiers reached Lexington, they found the Americans, under Captain Parker, ready for them. Captain Parker said to his men, "Don't fire unless you are fired on; but if they want a war, let it begin here." The fighting did begin there, April 19th, 1775; and when the British left the town on their way to Concord, seven Americans lay dead on the grass in front of the village church. At Concord, that same day, there was still harder fighting; and on the way back to Boston, a large number of the British were killed.

The next month, June 17th, 1775 a battle was fought on Bunker Hill in Charlestown, just outside of Boston. General Gage thought the Yankees wouldn't fight, but they did fight, in a way that General Gage never forgot; and though they had at last to retreat because their powder gave out, yet the British lost more than a thousand men. The contest at Bunker Hill was the first great battle of the Revolution; that is, of that war which overturned the British power in America, and made us a free people. Many Englishmen thought the king was wrong. They would not fight against us, and he was obliged to hire a large number of German soldiers to send to America. These Germans had to fight us whether they wanted to or not, for their king forced them to come.

[Footnote 16: Revere (Re-veer').]

135. Colonel Washington at Mount Vernon; Congress makes him General Washington, and sends him to take command of the American army.—At the time the battle of Bunker Hill was fought, Colonel George Washington was living very quietly at Mount Vernon. His brother Lawrence had died, and Mount Vernon was now his home. Washington was very well off: he had a fine estate and plenty of slaves to do the work on it; but when he died, many years later, he took good care to leave orders that all of his slaves should be set free as soon as it could be done.



Congress now made Colonel Washington general, and sent him to Cambridge, a town just outside of Boston, to take command of the American army. It was called the Continental Army because it was raised, not to fight for the people of Massachusetts, but for all the Americans on the continent, north and south. Washington took command of the army under a great elm, which is still standing. There, six months later, he raised the first American flag.[17]



[Footnote 17: See a picture of this and the other flags of the Revolution in paragraph 142.]

136. American sharpshooters;[18] Washington's need of cannon and powder; the attack on Canada; the British driven out of Boston.—Men now came from all parts of the country to join the Continental Army. Many of them were sharpshooters. In one case an officer set up a board with the figure of a man's nose chalked on it, for a mark. A hundred men fired at it at long distance, and sixty hit the nose. The newspapers gave them great praise for their skill and said, "Now, General Gage, look out for your nose."



Washington wanted to drive General Gage and the British soldiers out of Boston, but for months he could not get either cannon or powder. Benjamin Franklin said that we should have to fight as the Indians used to, with bows and arrows.

While Washington was waiting, a number of Americans marched against the British in Canada; but the cold weather came on, and they nearly starved to death: our men would sometimes take off their moccasins[19] and gnaw them, while they danced in the snow to keep their bare feet from freezing.

At last Washington got both cannon and powder. He dragged the cannon up to the top of some high land overlooking Boston harbor. He then sent word to General Howe, for Gage had gone, that if he did not leave Boston he would knock his ships to pieces. The British saw that they could not help themselves, so they made haste to get on board their vessels and sail away. They never came back to Boston again, but went to New York.

[Footnote 18: Sharpshooters: men who can fire and hit a small mark with a bullet at a long distance.]

[Footnote 19: Moccasins (mok'ka-sins): Indian shoes made of deerskin.]

137. The Declaration of Independence; "Down with the king!" Washington is driven from New York and across the Delaware River.—Washington got to New York first. While he was there, Congress,[20] on the 4th of July, 1776, declared the United States independent—that is, entirely free from the rule of the king of England. There was a gilded lead statue of King George the Third on horseback in New York. When the news of what Congress had done reached that city, there was a great cry of "Down with the king!" That night some of our men pulled down the statue, melted it up, and cast it into bullets.



The next month there was a battle on Long Island,[21] just across from New York City; the British gained the victory. Washington had to leave New York, and Lord Cornwallis, one of the British generals, chased him and his little army clear across the state of New Jersey. It looked at one time as though our men would all be taken prisoners, but Washington managed to seize a lot of small boats on the Delaware River[22] and get across into Pennsylvania: as the British had no boats, they could not follow.

[Footnote 20: Congress: see footnote 14 in paragraph 133.]

[Footnote 21: See map in paragraph 135.]

[Footnote 22: See map in paragraph 135.]

138. Washington's victory at Trenton, New Jersey.—Lord Cornwallis left fifteen hundred German soldiers at Trenton on the Delaware. He intended, as soon as the river froze over, to cross on the ice and attack Washington's army. But Washington did not wait for him. On Christmas night (1776) he took a large number of boats, filled them with soldiers, and secretly crossed over to New Jersey.[23] The weather was intensely cold, the river was full of floating ice, and a furious snow-storm set in. Many of our men were ragged and had only old broken shoes. They suffered terribly, and two of them were frozen to death.



The Germans at Trenton had been having a jolly Christmas, and had gone to bed, suspecting no danger. Suddenly Washington, with his men, rushed into the little town, and almost before they knew what had happened, a thousand Germans were made prisoners. The rest escaped to tell Lord Cornwallis how the Americans had beaten them. When Washington was driven out of New York, many Americans thought he would be captured. Now they were filled with joy. The battle of Trenton was the first battle won by the Continental Army.

[Footnote 23: See map in paragraph 135.]

139. Our victory at Princeton, New Jersey; the British take Philadelphia; winter at Valley Forge; Burgoyne beaten; the king of France agrees to help us.—Washington took his thousand prisoners over into Pennsylvania. A few days later he again crossed the Delaware into New Jersey. While Cornwallis was fast asleep in his tent, he slipped round him, got to Princeton,[24] and there beat a part of the British army. Cornwallis woke up and heard Washington's cannon. "That's thunder," he said. He was right; it was the thunder of another American victory.



But before the next winter set in, the British had taken the city of Philadelphia, then the capital of the United States. Washington's army was freezing and starving on the hillsides of Valley Forge,[25] about twenty miles northwest of Philadelphia.

But good news was coming. The Americans had won a great victory at Saratoga, New York,[26] over the British general, Burgoyne.[27] Dr. Franklin was then in Paris. When he heard that Burgoyne was beaten, he hurried off to the palace of the French king to tell him about it. The king of France hated the British, and he agreed to send money, ships, and soldiers to help us. When our men heard that at Valley Forge, they leaped and hurrahed for joy. Not long after that the British left Philadelphia, and we entered it in triumph.

[Footnote 24: Princeton: see map in paragraph 135.]

[Footnote 25: Valley Forge: see map in paragraph 135.]

[Footnote 26: Saratoga: see map in paragraph 135.]

[Footnote 27: Burgoyne (Bur'goin).]

140. The war at the South; Jasper; Cowpens; Greene and Cornwallis.—While these things were happening at the north, the British sent a fleet of vessels to take Charleston, South Carolina. They hammered away with their big guns at a little log fort under command of Colonel Moultrie. In the battle a cannon-ball struck the flag-pole on the fort, and cut it in two. The South Carolina flag fell to the ground outside the fort. Sergeant[28] William Jasper leaped down, and, while the British shot were striking all around him, seized the flag, climbed back, fastened it to a short staff, and raised it to its place, to show that the Americans would never give up the fort. The British, after fighting all day, saw that they could do nothing against palmetto logs[29] when defended by such men as Moultrie and Jasper; so they sailed away with such of their ships as had not been destroyed.



Several years later, Charleston was taken. Lord Cornwallis then took command of the British army in South Carolina. General Greene, of Rhode Island, had command of the Americans. He sent Daniel Morgan with his sharpshooters to meet part of the British army at Cowpens;[30] they did meet them, and sent them flying. Then Cornwallis determined to either whip General Greene or drive him out of the state. But General Greene worried Cornwallis so that at last he was glad enough to get into Virginia. He had found North and South Carolina like two hornets' nests, and the further he got away from those hornets, the better he was pleased.



[Footnote 28: Sergeant (sar'jent): a military officer of low rank.]

[Footnote 29: Palmetto logs: the wood of the palmetto tree is very soft and spongy; the cannon-balls, when they struck, would bury themselves in the logs, but would neither break them to pieces nor go through them.]

[Footnote 30: Cowpens: see map in this paragraph.]

141. Cornwallis and Benedict Arnold; Lafayette; Cornwallis shuts himself up in Yorktown.—When Lord Cornwallis got into Virginia he found Benedict Arnold waiting to help him. Arnold had been a general in the American army; Washington gave him the command of the fort at West Point, on the Hudson River,[31] and trusted him as though he was his brother. Arnold deceived him, and secretly offered to give up the fort to the British. We call a man who is false to his friends and to his country a traitor: it is the most shameful name we can fasten on him. Arnold was a traitor; and if we could have caught him, we should have hanged him; but he was cunning enough to run away and escape to the British. Now he was burning houses and towns in Virginia, and doing all that he could—as a traitor always will—to destroy those who had once been his best friends. He wanted to stay in Virginia and assist Cornwallis; but that general was a brave and honorable man: he despised Arnold, and did not want to have anything to do with him.

A young nobleman named Lafayette[32] had come over from France on purpose to help us against the British. Cornwallis laughed at him and called him a "boy"; but he found that General Lafayette was a "boy" who knew how to fight. The British commander moved toward the seacoast; Lafayette followed him; at length Cornwallis shut himself up with his army in Yorktown.[33]

[Footnote 31: West Point: see map in paragraph 135.]

[Footnote 32: Lafayette (Lah-fay-et').]

[Footnote 33: Yorktown: see map in paragraph 140.]

142. Washington marches against Yorktown, and takes it and the army of Cornwallis.—Washington, with his army, was then near New York City, watching the British there. The French king had done as he agreed, and had sent over warships and soldiers to help us; but so far they had never been able to do much. Now was the chance. Before the British knew what Washington was about, he had sent the French war-ships down to Yorktown to prevent Cornwallis from getting away by sea. Then, with his own army and some French soldiers besides, Washington quickly marched south to attack Yorktown by land.

When he got there he placed his cannon round the town, and began battering it to pieces. For more than a week he kept firing night and day. One house had over a thousand balls go through it. Its walls looked like a sieve. At last Cornwallis could not hold out any longer, and on October 19th, 1781, his army came out and gave themselves up as prisoners.

The Americans formed a line more than a mile long on one side of the road, and the French stood facing them on the other side. The French had on gay clothes, and looked very handsome; the clothes of Washington's men were patched and faded, but their eyes shone with a wonderful light—the light of victory. The British marched out slowly, between the two lines: somehow they found it pleasanter to look at the bright uniforms of the French, than to look at the eyes of the Americans.

]

[Footnote 34: The flag with the large crosses on it, on the left, is the English flag at the time of the American Revolution. The flag on the right is that which Washington raised at Cambridge, Massachusetts, January 2d, 1776. He simply took the English flag, and added thirteen stripes to represent the union of the thirteen English colonies. The flag in the centre, with its thirteen stars and thirteen stripes representing the thirteen states, is the first American national flag. It was adopted by Congress June 14th, 1777, not quite a year after we had declared ourselves independent of Great Britain. Beneath this flag is Washington's coat of arms with a Latin motto, meaning "The event justifies the deed." It is possible that the stars and stripes on our national flag came from the stars and stripes (or bars) on this ancient coat of arms, which may be seen on the tombstone of one of the Washington family, buried in 1583, in the parish church at Sulgrave, Northamptonshire, England.]

143. How the news of the taking of Yorktown was carried to Philadelphia; Lord Fairfax.—People at a distance noticed that the cannon had suddenly stopped firing. They looked at each other, and asked, "What does it mean?" All at once a man appears on horseback. He is riding with all his might toward Philadelphia, where Congress is. As he dashes past, he rises in his stirrups, swings his cap, and shouts with all his might, "Cornwallis is taken! Cornwallis is taken!" Then it was the people's turn to shout; and they made the hills ring with, "Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!"



Poor Lord Fairfax,[35] Washington's old friend, had always stood by the king. He was now over ninety. When he heard the cry, "Cornwallis is taken!" it was too much for the old man. He said to his negro servant, "Come, Joe; carry me to bed, for I'm sure it's high time for me to die."

[Footnote 35: See paragraph 126.]

144. Tearing down the British flag at New York; Washington goes back to Mount Vernon; he is elected President; his death; Lafayette visits his tomb.—The Revolutionary War had lasted seven years,—terrible years they were, years of sorrow, suffering, and death,—but now the end had come, and America was free. When the British left New York City, they nailed the British flag to a high pole on the wharf; but a Yankee sailor soon climbed the pole, tore down the flag of England, and hoisted the stars and stripes in its place. That was more than a hundred years ago. Now the English and the Americans have become good friends, and the English people see that the Revolution ended in the way that was best for both of us.



When it was clear that there would be no more fighting, Washington went back to Mount Vernon. He hoped to spend the rest of his life there. But the country needed him, and a few years later it chose him the first President of the United States.



Washington was made President in New York City, which was the capital of the United States at that time. A French gentleman who was there tells us how Washington, standing in the presence of thousands of people, placed his hand on the Bible, and solemnly swore that with the help of God he would protect and defend the United States of America.



Washington was elected President twice. When he died many of the people in England and France joined America in mourning for him; for all men honored his memory.

Lafayette came over to visit us many years afterward. He went to Mount Vernon, where Washington was buried. There he went down into the vault, and, kneeling by the side of the coffin, covered his face with his hands, and shed tears of gratitude to think that he had known such a man as Washington, and that Washington had been his friend.



145. Summary.—George Washington, the son of a Virginia planter, became the leader of the armies of the United States in the war of the Revolution. At the close of the war, after he had made America free, he was elected our first President. His name stands to-day among those of the greatest men in the history of the world.

When and where was George Washington born? What did he learn at school? What did he write in one of his writing-books? Tell about his sports and games at school. What is said of "Captain George"? Tell the story about the colt. What did George's mother say? Tell about George's visit to his brother and to the Fairfaxes. What is said of Lord Fairfax? What did he hire Washington to do? Tell about his surveying and his life in the woods. Tell about the Indian war-dance. What did the governor of Virginia do when Washington returned? What is said of Washington at the age of twenty-one? Tell about his journey to the French forts and his return. What is said about the Indian guide? What about the raft? What did the governor of Virginia do when Washington returned? What did the governor order him to do? What about Fort Necessity? Tell about General Braddock, and about what happened to Washington. What is said about the end of the war? What did King George the Third determine to do? What did the king want the Americans to do? How did they feel? What did the king say? What did the Americans say to that? What did some of the greatest men in England say? What did the king then try to do? Tell about the tea-ships. What happened in Boston? What was done to Boston? What help did the people of Boston get? What did the colonies now do? What did the people now begin to call themselves? What did they call the English troops?

Who commanded the British soldiers in Boston? What did he do? What about Paul Revere? What did Captain Parker of Lexington say to his men? What happened at Lexington and at Concord? Tell about the battle of Bunker Hill. What did many Englishmen refuse to do? Where was Colonel Washington living? What did Congress do? Where did Washington take command of the army? Tell about the sharpshooters. Tell about the march to Canada. How did Washington take Boston? Where did the British go? Where did Washington go? What did Congress do on July 4th, 1776? What happened in New York? What about the battle of Long Island? What did Cornwallis do? Tell about the victory at Trenton. What happened at Princeton? What city did the British take? Where was Washington's army? What happened at Saratoga? What did the king of France do? What happened at the south? Tell about Sergeant Jasper. What is said about General Greene? What did Cornwallis do? Where did he go? What is said about Benedict Arnold? What about Lafayette? Where did Cornwallis shut himself up with his army? What did Washington do? Tell about the surrender of Cornwallis. How was the news carried to Philadelphia? What is said of Lord Fairfax? How long had the war lasted? What was done at New York? What is said of General Washington after the war? Tell how he was made President. What happened when he died? What is said of Lafayette?



DANIEL BOONE (1734-1820).

146. Daniel Boone; what the hunters of the west did; Boone's life in North Carolina.—Before Washington began to fight the battles of the Revolution in the east, Daniel Boone and other famous hunters were fighting bears and Indians in what was then called the west. By that war in the woods, these brave and hardy men helped us to get possession of that part of the country.

Daniel Boone was born in Pennsylvania.[1] His father moved to North Carolina,[2] and Daniel helped him cut down the trees round their log cabin in the forest. He ploughed the land, which was thick with stumps, hoed the corn that grew up among those stumps, and then,—as there was no mill near,—he pounded it into meal for "johnny-cake." He learned how to handle a gun quite as soon as he did a hoe. The unfortunate deer or coon that saw young Boone coming toward him knew that he had seen his best days, and that he would soon have the whole Boone family sitting round him at the dinner-table.



[Footnote 1: He was born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.]

[Footnote 2: He settled near Wilkesboro, on the banks of the Yadkin River. See map in paragraph 150.]

147. Boone's wanderings in the western forests; his bear tree.—When Daniel had grown to manhood, he wandered off with his gun on his shoulder, and crossing the mountains, entered what is now the state of Tennessee. That whole country was then a wilderness, full of savage beasts and still more savage Indians; and Boone had many a sharp fight with both.

More than a hundred and thirty years ago, he cut these words on a beech-tree, still standing in Eastern Tennessee,[3]—"D. Boon killed a bar on (this) tree in the year 1760." You will see if you examine the tree, on which the words can still be read, that Boone could not spell very well; but he could do what the bear minded a good deal more,—he could shoot to kill.



[Footnote 3: The tree is still standing on the banks of Boone's Creek, near Jonesboro, Washington County, Tennessee.]

148. Boone goes hunting in Kentucky; what kind of game he found there; the Indians; the "Dark and Bloody Ground."—Nine years after he cut his name on that tree, Boone, with a few companions, went to a new part of the country. The Indians called it Kentucky. There he saw buffalo, deer, bears, and wolves enough to satisfy the best hunter in America.

This region was a kind of No Man's Land, because, though many tribes of Indians roamed over it, none of them pretended to own it. These bands of Indians were always fighting and trying to drive each other out, so Kentucky was often called the "Dark and Bloody Ground." But, much as the savages hated each other, they hated the white men, or the "pale-faces," as they called them, still more.

149. Indian tricks; the owls.—The hunters were on the lookout for these Indians, but the savages practised all kinds of tricks to get the hunters near enough to shoot them. Sometimes Boone would hear the gobble of a wild turkey. He would listen a moment, then he would say, That is not a wild turkey, but an Indian, imitating that bird; but he won't fool me and get me to come near enough to put a bullet through my head.

One evening an old hunter, on his way to his cabin, heard what seemed to be two young owls calling to each other. But his quick ear noticed that there was something not quite natural in their calls, and what was stranger still, that the owls seemed to be on the ground instead of being perched on trees, as all well-behaved owls would be. He crept cautiously along through the bushes till he saw something ahead which looked like a stump. He didn't altogether like the looks of the stump. He aimed his rifle at it, and fired. The stump, or what seemed to be one, fell over backward with a groan. He had killed an Indian, who had been waiting to kill him.

150. Boone makes the "Wilderness Road," and builds the fort at Boonesboro'.—In 1775 Boone, with a party of thirty men, chopped a path through the forest from the mountains of Eastern Tennessee to the Kentucky River,[4] a distance of about two hundred miles. This was the first path in that part of the country leading to the great west. It was called the "Wilderness Road." Over that road, which thousands of emigrants travelled afterward, Boone took his family, with other settlers, to the Kentucky River. There they built a fort called Boonesboro'. That fort was a great protection to all the first settlers in Kentucky. In fact, it is hard to see how the state could have grown up without it. So in one way, we can say with truth that Daniel Boone, the hunter, fighter, and road-maker, was a state-builder besides.