England? There the lady, I believe, died as late as 1825, having lived to see the young officer, her admirer in youth, become the great leader of the American Revolution, the first President of the United States, and to survive him twenty-five years.

NUMBER THIRTY-EIGHT.

SEVERAL CRITICAL OCCASIONS AND INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF WASHINGTON

Washington desires in early life a commission in the Royal Army-Exclusion of Colonists from promotion in the Royal establishments-His taste for military lifeHis distinguished services in the seven years' war attract no notice "at home"At its close, having no hope of advancement, he retires from military life-After an interval of seventeen years, re-appears commander-in-chief of the armies of United America-At the battle of Princeton, Washington, in his own opinion, ran the greatest risk of his life, being between the fire of both parties-Colonel Trumbull's picture-Reputation acquired by Washington abroad by the surprise of the Hessians and the battle at Princeton-Testimony of the historian Botta.

THE circumstances which decide the course of events in after life generally date from early years, and not obtaining notoriety at the time, are afterwards, even in the case of very eminent men, liable to be forgotten. It has already been seen by how narrow a chance Washington was in his boyhood prevented from becoming a British naval officer, and thus entering a career which would have withdrawn him infallibly from the scene of his subsequent service and glory. Probably without reference to any thing but the removal of a lad of fourteen years from home, and to the necessary discomforts and dangers of the service, his mother opposed this arrangement, and in so doing gave to the country the great leader of the Revolution, and the first President of the United States. In like manner, a strong desire and a fixed purpose of his own, formed at a period of life when men become (as far as

that is ever the case) the masters of their own destiny, led Washington to seek a commission in the Royal army. This object, so long as he remained in active service under the provincial government, during the old French war, he sought to effect in every way in which a young man of merit and honor can seek his own advancement. If he had succeeded, he would have followed the fortunes, as he must have shared the dangers, of military service; have fallen in action on some hard fought field in America, Europe, or the East, or have risen to distinction in the Britsh army; and thus, when the war of American Independence broke out, have been found, not at the head of its newly mustered armies, but in the ranks of its veteran enemies.

Less attention, perhaps, than they merit has been given to these early views of Washington, and the steps taken by him to carry them into effect. Accustomed as we are to an Independent government, and to all the consequences which flow from it, we do not form a lively conception of the state of things which existed when the seat of power and the fountain of honor were on the other side of the Atlantic; and when the only ordinary channel through which advancement could be sought or obtained in the Colonies, was that of the Royal favorites who were sent out to govern them. This, in fact, is one of the great vices of Colonial rule, which unfits it for a mature stage of national growth. It was unquestionably an active though not an avowed, perhaps not a consciously admitted, cause of the disaffection to the mother country, which prevailed on this side of the Atlantic, and which terminated in the separation. The cause of the colonies was, from the supposed necessity of the case, argued on narrow grounds. The right of the Imperial Parliament to tax America was denied, while an unlimited right of commercial regulation was admitted, under which the trade and navigation of the Colonies were subjected to the most oppressive restrictions, and manufacturing industry placed under the ban. The same

great and liberal minister, (Lord Chatham,) who rejoiced that America resisted the acts of Parliament, which laid a trifling duty on tea, would not allow the Colonies to manufacture" a hobnail," and was willing that a water-wheel should be abated as a nuisance. The loyal metaphysics of the "Sons of Liberty" found a constitutional argument against the tax on Colonial imports, but admitted the right, and hardly murmured against the policy of prohibiting Colonial manufactures, and restricting the navigation of the Colonies to the mother country. But it no doubt was a grievance equally felt, if not openly resented, that the paths of promotion, generally speaking, were shut upon the children of the country. It was only in exceptional, almost accidental cases, that a native could rise in the Royal army or navy, or in the Civil administration of the Colonies. Advancement in the Imperial government was out of the question, on any other condition than that of expatriation. All lucrative and honorable places in these Colonies, as in all Colonies, then as now, except so far as wisdom has been learned from experience, constituted the appanage of younger sons and the prey of needy courtiers. Posts of trust and emolument were appropriated, not for the purpose of rewarding merit or employing talent in the field of service, but to gratify the caprice or to consummate the bargains of the minister and his friends. It is unhappily but too easy for bad men to get into office, even when they are chosen by those who suffer, if they choose amiss; but this penalty furnishes some protection against an injudicious or corrupt choice. To impose by a sheer act of power an incompetent or a worthless magistrate, on a remote community, is at once a wrong and an insult. But this is, and almost by necessary operation, the genius of metropolitan rule over distant colonies. The insolence to the natives, of the young men sent out to govern Hindostan, is said to have been an active cause of the revolt, which has but just been suppressed at such hideous sacrifice of treasure and life.

Washington's taste, as I have said, was for the army; he inherited and early manifested a fondness for military life. He had, in an eminent degree, the spirit of subordination and command, the physical and moral courage, the energy, the system, the resource, the fortitude that never fainted, the wariness never surprised, and, above all, the ascendency over his associates, which make the consummate chief. That he gained few brilliant victories proves nothing to the contrary till it can be shown that, with the materials at his command, and with the odds to which he was opposed, it was possible to gain them. The common sense of mankind is a far sounder judge in this respect than the astute strategist. The chieftain, whose reputation rises in the midst of disasters, like Washington's in his youth, after the calamitous campaigns of 1754 and 1755, and who retains the confidence of a bleeding country, through years of exhaustion and despondency, may well afford to dispense with the glory which accrues from fortunate encounters. The entire series of Napoleon's victories does not reflect greater credit upon his skill as a commander, than the retreat from Moscow, which completed the loss of the largest and finest army which had ever been mustered in Europe.

With this hereditary aptitude for military service, Washington embraced with eagerness every opening for its pursuit, which Colonial life afforded; but this could only raise him to the humbler posts. He accepted, and that before he was of age, every opportunity of service within the gift of the Colonial government of Virginia; and at the age of twenty-one undertook a most dangerous mission in the winter, which, as he truly says himself, no other person could be found to accept, and which at the most imminent peril of his life, could, if it succeeded, gain him little but the credit of a faithful messenger. It so happened, that in performing the humble errand, he had the opportunity of displaying high military qualities. His modest diary showed a young man