you would
return, a belief due in large measure to the faith of Tayoga, and
we'll explain that you were called away suddenly on a mission of a
somewhat secret nature to the numerous friends who have been asking
about you."

Willet concurred, and he also said it was desirable that they should
depart at once for Virginia, where the provincial governors were to
meet in council, and from which province Braddock's force, or a
considerable portion of it, would march. Then Robert, after a
substantial supper, went to his room and slept. The next morning, both
Charteris and Grosvenor came to see him and expressed their delight at
his return. A few days later they were at sea with Grosvenor and other
young English officers, bound for the mouth of the James and the great
expedition against Fort Duquesne.

CHAPTER XIV

THE VIRGINIA CAPITAL

They were on a large schooner, and while Robert looked forward with
eagerness to the campaign, he also looked back with regret at the
roofs of New York, as they sank behind the sea. The city suited
him. It had seemed to him while he was there that he belonged in it,
and now that he was going away the feeling was stronger upon him than
ever. He resolved once more that it should be his home when the war
was over.

Their voyage down the coast was stormy and long. Baffling winds
continually beat them back, and, then they lay for long periods in
dead calms, but at last they reached the mouth of the James, going
presently the short distance overland to Williamsburg, the town that
had succeeded Jamestown as the capital of the great province of
Virginia.

Spring was already coming here in the south and in the lowlands by the
sea, and the tinge of green in the foliage and the warm winds were
grateful after the winter of the cold north. Robert, eager as always
for new scenes, and fresh knowledge, anticipated with curiosity his
first sight of Williamsburg, one of the oldest British towns in North
America. He knew that it was not large, but he found it even smaller
than he had expected.

He and his comrades reached it on horseback, and they found that it
contained only a thousand inhabitants, and one street, straight and
very wide. On this street stood the brick buildings of William and
Mary, the oldest college in the country, a new capitol erected in the
place of one burned, not long before, and a large building called the
Governor's Palace. It looked very small, very quiet, and very con