The Story Hour: A Book for the Home and the Kindergarten

by Kate Douglas Smith Wiggin

  GREAT GEORGE WASHINGTON, PART II.

  "The good story-teller effects much; he has an ennobling effect uponchildren,--so much the more ennobling that he does not appear to intendit,"--FROEBEL.

  All this time while George Washington had been growing up,--first alittle boy, then a larger boy, and then a young surveyor,--all this timethe French and English and Indians were unhappy and uncomfortable in thecountry north of Virginia. The French wanted all the land, so did theEnglish, and the Indians saw that there would be no room for them,whichever had it, so they all began to trouble each other and to quarreland fight.

  These troubles grew so bad at last that the Virginians began to beafraid of the French and Indians, and thought they must have somesoldiers of their own ready to fight.

  George Washington was only nineteen then, but everybody knew he was wiseand brave, so they chose him to teach the soldiers near his home how tomarch and to fight.

  Then the king and the people of England grew very uneasy at all thisquarreling, and they sent over soldiers and cannon and powder, andcommenced to get ready to fight in earnest. Washington was made a major,and he had to go a thousand miles, in the middle of winter, into theIndian and French country, to see the chiefs and the soldiers, and findout about the troubles.

  When he came back again, all the people were so pleased with his courageand with the wise way in which he had behaved, that they made himlieutenant-colonel.

  Then began a long war between the French and the English, which lastedseven years. Washington fought through all of it, and was made acolonel, and by and by commander of all the soldiers in Virginia. Hebuilt forts and roads, he gained and lost battles, he fought the Indiansand the French; and by all this trouble and hard work he learned to be agreat soldier.

  In many of the battles of this war, Washington and the Virginians didnot wear a uniform like the English soldiers, but a buckskin shirt andfringed leggings like the Indians.

  From beginning to end of some of the battles, Washington rode aboutamong the men, telling them where to go and how to fight; the bulletswere whistling around him all the time, but he said he liked the music.

  By and by the war was over; the French were driven back to their ownpart of the country, and Washington went home to Mt. Vernon to rest, andtook with him his wife, lovely Martha Washington, whom he had met andmarried while he was fighting the French and Indians.

  While he was at Mt. Vernon he saw all his horses again,--"Valiant" and"Magnolia" and "Chinkling" and "Ajax,"--and had grand gallops over thecountry.

  He had some fine dogs, too, to run by his side, and help him hunt thebushy-tailed foxes. "Vulcan" and "Bingwood" and "Music" and "Sweetlips"were the names of some of them. You may be sure the dogs were glad whenthey had their master home again.

  But Washington did not have long to rest, for another war was coming,the great war of the Revolution.

  Little children cannot understand all the reasons for this war, but Ican tell you some of them.

  You remember in the story of Thanksgiving I told you about the Pilgrimfathers, who came from England to this country because their king wouldnot let them pray to God as they liked. That king was dead now, andthere was another in his place, a king with the name of George, like ourWashington.

  Now our great-grandfathers had always loved England and Englishmen,because many of their friends were still living there, and because itwas their old home.

  The king gave them governors to help take care of their people, andsoldiers to fight for them, and they sent to England for many things towear and to eat.

  But just before this Revolutionary War, the king and the great men whohelped him began to say that things should be done in this countrythat our people did not think right at all. The king said they mustbuy expensive stamps to put on all their newspapers and almanacs andlawyer's papers, and that they must pay very high taxes on their tea andpaper and glass, and he sent soldiers to see that this was done.

  This made our great-grandfathers very angry. They refused to pay thetaxes, they would not buy anything from England any more, and some meneven went on board the ships, as they came into Boston Harbor, and threwthe tea over into the water.

  So fifty-one men were chosen from all over the country, and they metat Philadelphia, to see what could be done. Washington was sent fromVirginia. And after they had talked very solemnly, they all thoughtthere would be great trouble soon, and Washington went home to drill thesoldiers.

  Then the war began with the battle of Lexington, in New England, andsoon Washington was made commander in chief of the armies.

  He rode the whole distance from Philadelphia to Boston on horseback,with a troop of officers; and all the people on the way came to see him,bringing bands of music and cheering him as he went by. He rode intocamp in the morning. The soldiers were drawn up in the road, and men andwomen and children who had come to look at Washington were crowded allabout. They saw a tall, splendid, handsome man in a blue coat with bufffacings, and epaulets on his shoulders. As he took off his hat, drew hisshining sword and raised it in sight of all the people, the cannon beganto thunder, and all the people hurrahed and tossed their hats in theair.

  Of course he looked very splendid, and they all knew how brave he was,and thought he would soon put an end to the war.

  But it did not happen as they expected, for this was only the beginning,and the war lasted seven long years.

  Fighting is always hard, even if you have plenty of soldiers and plentyfor them to eat; but Washington had very few soldiers, and very littlepowder for the guns, and little food for the men to eat.

  The soldiers were not in uniform, as ours are to-day; but each wasdressed just as he happened to come from his shop or his farm.

  Washington ordered hunting shirts for them, such as he wore when he wentto fight the Indians, for he knew they would look more like soldiers ifall were dressed alike.

  Of course many people thought that our men would be beaten, as the warwent on; but Washington never thought so, for he was sure our side wasright.

  I hardly know what he would have done, at last, if the French people hadnot promised to come over and help us, and to send us money and men andships. All the people in the army thanked God when they heard it, andfired their guns for joy.

  A brave young man named Lafayette came with the French soldiers, and hegrew to be Washington's great friend, and fought for us all through theRevolution.

  Many battles were fought in this war, and Washington lost some of them,and a great many of his men were killed.

  You could hardly understand how much trouble he had. In the winter, whenthe snow was deep on the ground, he had no houses or huts for his men tosleep in; his soldiers were ragged and cold by day, and had not blanketsenough to keep them warm by night; their shoes were old and worn, andthey had to wrap cloths around their feet to keep them from freezing.

  When they marched to the Delaware River, one cold Christmas night, asoldier who was sent after them, with a message for Washington, tracedthem by their footprints on the snow, all reddened with the blood fromtheir poor cut feet.

  They must have been very brave and patient to have fought at all, whenthey were so cold and ragged and hungry.

  Washington suffered a great deal in seeing his soldiers so wretched, andI am sure that, with all his strength and courage, he would sometimeshave given up hope, if he had not talked and prayed to God a great deal,and asked Him to help him.

  In one of the hardest times of the whole war, Washington was stayingat a farmer's house. One morning, he rode out very early to visit thesoldiers. The farmer went into the fields soon after, and as he waspassing a brook where a great many bushes were growing, he heard a deepvoice from the thicket. He looked through the leaves, and saw Washingtonon his knees, on the ground, praying to God for his soldiers. He hadfastened his horse to a tree, and come away by himself to ask God tohelp them.

  At last the war came to an end; the English were beaten, and our armiessent up praise and thanks to Go
d.

  Then the soldiers went quietly back to their homes, and Washington badeall his officers good-by, and thanked them for their help and theircourage.

  The little room in New York where he said farewell is kept to show tovisitors now, and you can see it some day yourselves.

  Then Washington went home to Mt. Vernon to rest; but before he had beenthere long, the people found out that they must have some one to helptake care of them, as they had nothing to do with the king of Englandany more; and they asked Washington to come and be the first Presidentof the United States.

  So he did as they wished, and was as wise and good, and as careful andfine a President as he had been surveyor, soldier, and general.

  You know we always call Washington the Father of his Country, because hedid so much for us and helped to make the United States so great.

  After he died, there were parks and mountains and villages and towns andcities named for him all over the land, because people loved him so andprized so highly what he had done for them.

  In the city of Washington there is a building where you can see manyof the things that belonged to the first President, when he was alive.There is his soldier's coat, his sword, and in an old camp chest are theplates and knives and forks that he used in the Revolution.

  There is a tall, splendid monument of shining gray stone in that city,that towers far, far above all the highest roofs and spires. It wasbuilt in memory of George Washington, by the people of the UnitedStates, to show that they loved and would always remember the Father ofhis Country.