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Kansas University Weekly.
of servants, carriages and horses, everything included belonging to an aristocratic home of that day. His manner was always grave and dignified. His conduct on all occasions, both public and private, was strictly modeled according to the etiquette of his time.
Yet there was no affection in his disposition. His dignity was natural, nor did it prevent him from sympathizing with his fellowmen of every station. His tall commanding figure well lent itself to the calm, almost severe majesty of his deportment. In that pale face and in those blue eyes was a world of slumbering energy. He loved the retirement of his home at Mount Vernon. It was his harbor of repose where he repeatedly furled his sail and fancied himself anchored for life. No impulse of ambition tempted him from it; nothing but the call of his country and his devotion to the public good.
The American Revolution will forever remain a mystery both to the student and to the historian. Such an unequal contest is nowhere recorded. On the one side were wealth, power and discipline; on the other their direct opposites. To bring harmony out of discord, to produce strength out of weakness and to create resources where they did not exist, was the work of Washington in this great struggle. Without arms or ammunition, with nothing to rely upon but the justice of his cause and the protection of Heaven, he entered the unequal contest. The trumpet of war sounded through all our peaceful settlements, calling the artisan from his bench, the farmer from his plow, the man of wealth from his repose. Then it was that Washington stood serene and hopeful, his clear calm voice heard above the tumult, inspiring hope and courage. Never before or since has so much depended on a single man, for the fate of a continent rested on the issue of the struggle.
There are many well versed in military affairs who point out mistakes in Washington's management of battles and campaigns, calling them violations of good tactics. Judged from the modern standard of warfare,the criticisms may be just. But where is the leader of modern times who made fewer mistakes or with such limited means accomplished such great results?
To begin with raw recruits under a system of short enlistments which precluded these recruits from becoming veterans without a consolidated government to lean upon, without means, without arms, surrounded by the suspicious and
despondent, to keep the field against one of the strongest nations on the face of the globe and finally to overwhelm his adversaries and win the independence of his country, required a man of no ordinary genius and a warrior of transcendent ability.
Patient and watchful, provoked into no rashness, frightened into no delay, cautious in his his approach, bold in his onset, orderly in his retreat, he moves at the head of his brave but ill-furnished and distracted army. But his excellent generalship is not his strongest quality. As a warrior he may be surpassed, but as a man he is without a peer. Equal to any crisis, successful in all his undertakings, faithful in every trial, without a spot on his name, the history of the race cannot match him.
It is a deplorable fact that a military life almost always leads men to turn their backs upon virtue. But not a stain clings to Washington. He was ever the same great, noble, pure man; whether on the tented field, in the legislative hall or in the quiet retirement of Mount Vernon.
Washington was an intensely religious man. That brow which would have awed the Roman Senate in its days of pride was bowed to the dust before its Maker. Both in prosperity and in the darkest hours of adversity his soul trusted in its God.
Behold him moving through the wretched hovels of Morristown and Valley Forge. Witness his anguish of soul as he notes the awful destitution of his patriot band; the frozen earth for a pillow, the vaulted skies their covering and filthy rags their clothing. With what pain he beholds those conditions which he is powerless to ameliorate. The load is more than he can bear. Slowly he makes his way to the silent forest; now he kneels and that voice never known to falter in command is choked with emotion, as he prays in behalf of his suffering army and his bleeding country. No grander sight was ever seen. His prayer was uttered in firm reliance upon the Name that is above every name. No more earnest prayer was ever offered, and none was ever more completely and wonderfully answered. Inspired by its beloved leader, that poor, suffering, neglected legion, shook the very earth under its glorious advance and a new nation was built upon the new continent of America.
When at last the struggle was over it was pleasant to see how easily Washington passed from his position as commander of armies to become a quiet country gentleman.