thud! thud! of their footsteps was heard, on the quiet country road. They passed many a farm-house where the inmates lay dreaming of liberty, -so silently that they were not wakened from their

dreams.

When they reached Lexington, the sun was just rising, and threw the long shadow of Lexington meeting-house over the grass. Close by the meeting-house, talking earnestly, were a group of less than a hundred men. These were minute-men, with muskets, in hand. When they saw the red coats of the soldiers glittering in the morning sun, they began to disperse. Up rode Major Pitcairn, who was at the head of the troops, shouting fiercely, "Disperse, you rebels ! Throw down your arms, and disperse !"

The troops hurrahed; an officer discharged his pistol, and then the soldiery fired among the provincials. The minute-men had been instructed not to fire unless they were first fired upon by the British. They now promptly returned fire, wounding three of the soldiers. This was answered by a fierce volley from the British, under which the Americans began a retreat, and the troops marched on unmolested to Concord, leaving them to pick up their dead, laughing, meanwhile, at the Yankees, who, they said, needed only the first smell of gunpowder to make them run.

This was the first blood shed in the coming war. There, on the tender, budding grass at Lexington, under the shining morning sun, near the shadow of the meeting-house, lay eight dead men, - the first victims in the great cause of liberty in America.

On went the troops to Concord, dividing there into two detachments which went straight to the two points where stores were hidden, so straight that it was said afterwards each band had an American pilot, who knew more of the secrets of his countrymen than the British had been able to learn. There was a Boston barber (not our loyal barber, but a Tory), and a tailor, seen among the troops in soldiers' clothes, and bad as they hated the soldiers, the Americans hated worse these "Judases," who would betray their own fellow-countrymen.

The troops took the guns and powder, spiked the cannon, set fire to the gun-carriages, and took one hundred barrels of flour, half of which they tumbled into the river. Going onward they found the minute-men mustered on a bridge to the north, one hundred and fifty strong. They fired and killed two of them, and then a volley blazed back from the American lines. The British troops fell back

before it. The Americans pursued, and almost in a twinkling back went the red-coats pell-mell, in retreat toward Lexington, followed by the minute-men. On they went in swift retreat. From barns, fences, and trees, all along the road, rang the quick crack of muskets picking off a British soldier. Every bush seemed to hold a patriot, and when the British ran panting into Lexington, where Lord Percy had been sent from Boston to join them with some fresh troops, they had left two hundred and ninety-three men, dead and dying, on the road from thence to Concord. Percy formed a hollow square to surround the fugitives, and, panting with fatigue and thirst, with their tongues hanging from their mouths like dogs, the soldiery threw themselves down upon the ground exhausted and beaten, with no breath left even to laugh at Yankees. When one could speak, he said frankly, "They fought like bears, and I would as soon storm hell, as fight them again.”

66

Percy led them back to Boston, but all the way the militia fired from every place where a man and a musket could be hidden. In the morning Lord Percy had marched gayly out of Boston, his band playing Yankee Doodle" in derision. The evening saw him coming slowly into Charlestown, tired out, his redcoats gray with mud and dust. "Halloa," cried a young rebel from behind a safe corner, as he watched him setting out that morning, "You play "Yankee Doodle' now, but before long you will play Chevy Chase.""1 It had been a chase, indeed. And thus ended the battle of Lexington.

·

Congress meets again.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

TICONDEROGA AND BUNKER HILL.

- Green

George Washington made Commander of the Armies. Mountain Boys. -- Ethan Allen takes Ticonderoga and Crown Point. Oglethorpe refuses to fight the Americans. - Noble Words of Samuel Adams. Americans on Bunker Hill. Battle of Bunker Hill. - The Monument there.

MAY 10, 1755, the Continental Congress met again in Philadelphia. They had a new man in their ranks: Thomas Jefferson, whom we heard of in Virginia before the war.

This time Congress took stronger measures, and formed a "Federal Union," taking a pledge that the colonies would stand by each other

1 A patriotic newspaper of the time gives this story of the boy's jest as an authentic one. I hope you all know the heroic old battle of Chevy Chase, in which one of this very Lord Percy's ancestors figures.

in the struggle that was coming, and that all should be as one. They did not give up remonstrating with the king yet, but sent him an eloquent appeal, which he took no notice of except by calling them rebels.

They talked over plans for raising an army, for collecting stores, and fortifying their weak places. Their most memorable act was the appointment of a commander-in-chief of the colonial armies.

Mr. Johnson of Maryland rose and nominated for commander, George Washington of Virginia, and it was unanimously approved. You have already heard something of Washington; of his service in the French and Indian wars, and his loyalty to his country when these new troubles had arisen. Ever since the French wars, until he was called to join the Continental Congress, he had lived quietly down in Virginia, working hard in the care of his large plantation, and all his great family of slaves, which numbered several hundred. He had lived a simple life, although he was a rich man, and his chief amusement had been long horse-back rides, or hunting excursions, of which he was very fond. There was no show nor pretense about him, but everybody who knew him, knew that here was an honest, brave, clearheaded gentleman, loyal to the core, a good soldier, and the fittest man whom they could select to lead the provincial army.

When his appointment was confirmed, he rose and thanked Congress in a manly, straightforward speech. He told them he very much feared he was not equal to the high trust they had given him, but he would do his best in

the service of his coun

George Washington.

try. And he told them he should accept no money for his services,

beyond the bare expenses he incurred, and those, he doubted not, they would be able to discharge.

The picture of this Virginia gentleman, the soldier-farmer, standing with his tall figure in the midst of this listening Congress, is a picture quite as grand as any gallery of Roman heroes furnishes.

Before Congress adjourned stirring news reached them. It would have reached them long before, if news could travel as fast then as

Benf. Franklin

now. This news came

slowly, even for those days. England had refused to carry the mails in her rebellious provinces, or perhaps it I would be more correct to say the Americans refused to use British letter-carriers. Benjamin Franklin had just been made general-postmaster by Continental Congress, and carrying news was slower business than ever, in the change of affairs. Spite of all obstacles, however, news did reach Philadelphia that the forts Crown Point and Ticonderoga, famous in the French war, had been taken by the Americans on the

10th of May, the very day Congress assembled. Let me tell you how this happened.

Up among the mountains in what is now the State of Vermont, companies of brave fellows were formed, who called themselves. "Green Mountain Boys." The foremost leader among them was Colonel Ethan Allen, a man of great energy and resolution. To him was intrusted the attack upon Ticonderoga. Allen's men were joined by another company under Colonel Benedict Arnold, a volunteer from New Haven, Connecticut, who had lately enlisted in