George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 4, 15th edition.

[224] claimed to be his superior; and, for the pur-

chap. IX.} 1756.

pose of a personal appeal to Shirley,¹ he made a winter's journey to Boston. How different was to be his next entry into that town! Shirley, who wished to make him second² in command in an expedition against Fort Duquesne, sustained his claim.³ When his authority was established, his own officers still needed training and instruction, tents, arms, and ammunition. He visited in person the outposts, from the Potomac to Fort Dinwiddie, on Jackson's River; but he had not force enough to protect the region. The low countries could not spare their white men, for these must watch their negro slaves. From the Western Valley every settler had already been driven. From the valley of the Shenandoah they were beginning to retreat, in droves of fifties, till the Blue Ridge became the frontier of Virginia. ‘The supplicating tears of the women and moving petitions of the men,’ wrote Washington, ‘melt me into such deadly sorrow, that, for the people's ease, I could offer myself a willing sacrifice to the butchering enemy.’

The interior settlements of Pennsylvania were exposed to the same calamities, and domestic faction impeded measures of defence. In that province, where popular power was intrenched impregnably, the proprietaries, acting in concert with the Board of Trade, sought to enlarge their prerogatives; to take into their own hands the management of the revenue