When  Washington  drew  his  sword  beneath  the
Cambridge  elm  he  stood  forth  as  the  first  Amer-
ican, the  best  type  of  man  that  the  New  World
could  produce,  with  no  provincial  taint  upon  him,
and  no  shadow  of  the  colonial  past  clouding  his
path.  It  was  this  great  quality  that  gave  the  strug-
gle which  he  led  a  character  it  would  never  have
attained  without  a  leader  so  constituted.  Had  he
been  merely  a  colonial  Englishman,  had  he  not
risen  at  once  to  the  conception  of  an  American
nation,  the  world  would  have  looked  at  us  with
very  different  eyes.  It  was  the  splendid  dignity
of  the  man,  quite  as  much  as  his  fighting  capacity,
which  impressed  Europe.  Kings  and  ministers,
looking  on  dispassionately,  soon  realized  that  here
was  a  really  considerable  man,  no  ordinary  agita-
tor or  revolutionist,  but  a  great  man  on  a  great
stage  with  great  conceptions.  England,  indeed,
talked  about  a  militia  colonel,  but  this  chatter  dis-
appeared in  the  smoke  of  Trenton,  and  even  Eng-
land came  to  look  upon  him  as  the  all-powerfid
spirit  of  the  Revolution.  Dull  men  and  colonial
squires  do  not  grasp  a  great  idea  and  carry  it  into
action  on  the  world's  stage  in  a  few  months.  To
stand  forward  at  the  head  of  raw  armies  and  of  a
colonial  people  as  a  national  leader,  calm,  dignified,
and  far-seeing,  requires  not  only  character,  but  in-
tellect of  the  highest  and  strongest  kind.  Now
that  we  have  come  as  a  people,  after  more  than  a


246  GEORGE  WASHINGTON.
