She blushed, and her eyes again dropped to the floor in an unaccountable manner.

"Why does she act so strangely?" thought Noah. "One would think she had seen me before; but no, I never knew a Miss Saturfield.”

He went away and joined the forces under Captain Washington, and, in dead winter, they set out to meet the depredating band of Indians which had been doing so much mischief. Through the snows of dead winter the company marched, until they came upon the Indians' camp one morning and, after a skirmish, put the savages to flight. The campaign and skirmish were so insignificant that the average historian and biographer has failed to mention them.

On this campaign the boy George Washington was taking his first lessons in warfare.

George Washington was not over two or three years of age, when his father removed to an estate in Stafford County, opposite Fredericksburg. The house stood on a rising ground overlooking a meadow which bordered the Rappahannock. This was the boyhood home of the man who was to become the father of his country. From this spot the traditional story of the hatchet and the cherry tree originated. Whether true or false, the story is illustrative of the sterling truthfulness of the boy, who became the greatest of all Americans.

At the time of George Washington's boyhood, the means of instruction in Virginia were limited, and it was the custom among the wealthy planters to send their sons to England to complete their education, as was done in case of Noah Stevens and Lawrence Washington, George's oldest brother. The dawning intellect of young George Washington received the rudiments of education in the best establishment for the purpose that the neighborhood afforded. It was what in popular parlance was called an "old field school-house," humble enough in its pretensions, and kept by one of his father's tenants named Hobby. The instruction received in this primitive school-house was of the simplest kind, reading, writing and arithmetic; but a great mind does not require a college, or learned professors to acquire an education. Washington was no graduate of any college save God's great academy of nature, and from that fountain of original truth he drank deep draughts of wisdom. He had the benefit of mental and moral worth from an excellent father. When he had reached the age of seven or eight years, his brother Lawrence returned from England, a well-educated and accomplished youth. The brothers were always strongly attached to each other. Lawrence being the elder by fourteen years, looked down with a protecting eye upon the boy whose dawning intelli

gence and perfect rectitude won his regard; while George regarded his manly and cultured brother as a model in mind and manners.

Lawrence Washington, as well as his younger brother, inherited something of the old military spirit of the family, and when Spanish depredations on British commerce called forth resentment, even from the colonies, he was among the first to raise a company of Virginians to sail under Admiral Vernon. Noah Stevens was a lieutenant under Lawrence Washington. When George Washington, then a lad, saw the sudden outburst of military ardor, he caught the infection. This was

the secret of that military spirit so often cited of his boyhood days. He had seen his brother fitted out for the wars, and listened with kindling eye and ardent enthusiasm to the letters he wrote home, and his thoughts and dreams were of war. All his amusements took a military turn. His schoolmates became his soldiers, whom he marched in parade, or marshalled in mimic frays. Strange that one so kind and gentle, so tender-hearted and noble, should be a warrior from his childhood; yet we must ever bear in mind that bravery, greatness, gentleness and kind-heartedness go hand in hand.

In the autumn of 1742, Lawrence Washington returned home from the war with Spain, while Noah Stevens lingered a few months longer in the

southern co.onies.

Captain Washington had fallen in love with Anne, eldest daughter of Honorable William Fairfax, of Fairfax County, who reciprocated his affections, and they were betrothed. They were to be married soon after his return; but the wedding was postponed by the sudden death of his father, April 12, 1743. Mr. Washington, at time of his death, was only forty-nine years of age. George had been absent from home on a visit during his father's illness, and just returned in time to receive a parting look of affection from his dying parent.

Mr. Augustine Washington left a large estate, which by will he distributed among his children. To Lawrence, he gave the large estate on the banks of the Potomac, with other real property and several shares in iron-works. Augustine, the second son by the first marriage, got the old homestead and estate in Westmoreland. The children by the second marriage were all well provided for, and George, when he became of age, was to receive the house and lands on the Rappahannock. In July following the death of his father, Lawrence Washington married Miss Fairfax and settled himself on his estate on the banks of the Potomac, to which he gave the name of Mount Vernon in honor of his friend Admiral Vernon. Augustine took up his abode at the old homestead at Bridges Creek.

At the death of his father, George Washington

was only eleven years of age, and the other children of the second marriage had been left under the guardianship of their mother, to whose care all the property was intrusted until they came of age. She was eminently worthy of the trust. She was

a plain woman, endowed with good sense, thorough conscientiousness and prompt decision. She governed her family strictly, but kindly, exacting deference while she inspired affection. George has been called her favorite child, and perhaps he was, yet she never gave undue preference, and the implicit deference exacted from him in childhood continued to be habitually observed by him to the day of her death. From his mother he inherited a high temper and spirit of command; but her early training taught him to restrain and govern that temper, and to square his conduct on the exactest principles of justice.

It was the design of George Washington's father to send his son to England, where he might have the advantages of Oxford or some other college; but his father's early death frustrated these plans, besides depriving George of his father's instructions, and the tuition of Hobby being too limited for the boy's growing wants, George was sent to reside with Augustine Washington at Bridge Creek, where he might enjoy the benefit of a superior school kept by Mr. Williams.