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Virginians, now is your time!

Show them

the sort of mettle you are made of!" cried Washington to the provincials.

They recognized him, and, with yells of joy, dashed forward into the heat of the contest. Taking refuge behind trees, stones and whatever would screen them, they picked off the Indians one by one, and checked the onslaught. The terrible conflict raged on every side. The British regulars were horrified and panic stricken with fighting a foe whom they could not see. The officers behaved with consummate bravery, and Washington beheld with admiration those who, in camp or on the march, had appeared to him to have an almost feminine regard for personal ease and convenience, now exposing themselves to immediate death with a courage that kindled with the thickening horrors. Their field-pieces had been captured early in the engagement, and General Gage, aided by Major Bridges, formed two or three hundred regulars and charged the enemy to recover the guns. Wild yells and flashing rifles met them on every hand. With fixed bayonets, the maddened soldiers dashed right into the bushes on the muzzles of the pieces of the concealed foe. Many were slain with Indian hatchets, and some ran the Indians through with their bayonets.

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Egad! zounds! drive them from the woods!

sweep them from the face of the earth!" roared Bridges, as, with drawn sword, he leaped his horse in a thicket.

A score of rifles were discharged at once, some so near to his face, that the powder burned his cheeks. With a snort of agony, his horse reared and leaped backward. The volleys of fire and death mowed down the soldiers, they gave way. When regulars become panic stricken, they are harder to manage than volunteers, for they are never taught self-reliance.

Major Bridges, with a slight wound on his face, his hat shot off his head and his horse wounded in the neck, fell back with the others. Gage was trying to rally his men, ordering them to form again.

"What are you going to do?" Bridges asked, almost beside himself with vexation.

"Turn their left flank!" answered Gage.

Turn the devil!" roared Bridges. "You might as well attempt to turn the mountains. "

Gage soon learned this, and his troops again gave way and fell back to the main army, where, huddled together, they were shot down like quails. The officers, almost without exception, behaved with becoming gallantry. In the vain hope of inspiriting the men to drive off the enemy from the flanks and regain the cannon, they would dash

forward singly or in groups, to be shot down or beaten back; for the Indians aimed at every one who appeared to have command. Some were killed by random shots of their own men, who, crowded in masses, fired with affrighted rapidity, but without aim. Soldiers in front were killed by those in the rear, and the Virginians, who had posted themselves behind stones and trees, at times found themselves in as much danger from the regulars in their rear, as from the enemy in in front. Washington, seeing the danger his friends were in from the regulars, called to Major Bridges, saying:

"Can't these soldiers be kept from shooting the men before them?"

"Zounds! they don't know what they are doing," answered Bridges.

Between friend and foe, the slaughter of the officers was terrible. Throughout the disastrous day, Washington distinguished himself by his courage and presence of mind. Orme and Morris were wounded and disabled early in the action, and Bridges being called to aid Gage and Burton, the whole duty of carrying the orders of the general devolved on him. His danger was imminent and incessant. He was in every part of the field, and a conspicuous mark for the murderous rifles of the enemy. Two horses were killed under him,

and four bullets passed through his coat; yet he escaped without a wound. One Indian singled him out and fired a number of shots at him but, missing, believed that some supernatural power guarded him from harm. He was sent with Stevens' company of Virginians to the main body to bring the artillery into action. All there was likewise in confusion, for the Indians had extended themselves along the ravines so as to flank the reserve and carry slaughter into the ranks. Sir Peter Haklet had been shot down at he head of his regiment. The men who should have served guns were paralyzed. Had they raked the ravines on their right and left with grapeshot, the day might have been saved. In his ardor, Washington sprang from his horse and called to Captain Stevens:

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Come and help me man the cannon, captain."

They seized a brass field-piece, and Washington aimed it with his own hand and directed an effective discharge into the woods; but the efforts and the examples of the heroic Virginians were of no avail. The men could not be kept at the guns.

"Where is Major Bridges?" asked General Braddock, who still remained in the centre of the field, in the desperate hope of retrieving the fortunes of the day.

"I do not know," Washington answered. "I have not seen him for one hour."

"I saw him going to the rear," said Captain Stewart, who, with Captain Stevens, had been thrown in front of Braddock's army with their riflemen to protect them.

"Was he wounded?"

"Yes; he had a shot in the breast or shoulder," answered Stewart.

"Colonel," said the general calmly, "the fight is desperate."

"Yes, General Braddock, and we are going to be driven from the field."

Just then a bullet killed the fifth horse that had that day died under General Braddock.

Springing to his feet the general cried:

"Never!"

Captain Stevens at this moment came up and offered his horse to the general. He mounted as Washington galloped forward to form the Virginians to cover the regulars until they could fall back and re-form their lines. Braddock's secretary, Shirley, fell dead at his side; still the general kept his ground, vainly endeavoring to check the flight of his men, or at least to effect their retreat in good order. Before Washington returned, a bullet passed through Braddock's right arm and lodged in his lungs. The general swayed in his saddle.

"Look, Captain Stewart! Catch the general;