ed
draught-horses had arrived, and there was no prospect of more. There
was equal disappointment in provisions, both as to quantity and
quality, and he had to send round the country to buy cattle for the
subsistence of the troops.

Fortunately, while the general was venting his spleen in anathemas
against army contractors, Benjamin Franklin arrived at Fredericktown.
That eminent man, then about forty-nine years of age, had been for
many years member of the Pennsylvania Assembly, and was now
postmaster-general for America. The Assembly understood that Braddock
was incensed against them, supposing them adverse to the service of
the war. They had procured Franklin to wait upon him, not as if sent
by them, but as if he came in his capacity of postmaster-general, to
arrange for the sure and speedy transmission of dispatches between the
commander-in-chief and the governors of the provinces.

He was well received, and became a daily guest at the general's table.
As the whole delay of the army was caused by the want of conveyances,
Franklin observed one day to the general that it was a pity the troops
had not been landed in Pennsylvania, where almost every farmer had his
wagon. "Then, sir," replied Braddock, "you who are a man of interest
there can probably procure them for me, and I beg you will." Franklin
consented. An instrument in writing was drawn up, empowering him to
contract for one hundred and fifty wagons, with four horses to each
wagon, and fifteen hundred saddle or pack-horses for the service of
his majesty's forces, to be at Wills' Creek on or before the 20th of
May, and he promptly departed for Lancaster to execute the commission.

After his departure, Braddock, attended by his staff, and his guard of
light horse, set off for Wills' Creek by the way of Winchester, the
road along the north side of the Potomac not being yet made. "This
gave him," writes Washington, "a good opportunity to see the absurdity
of the route, and of damning it very heartily." Three of Washington's
horses were knocked up before they reached Winchester, and he had to
purchase others. The discomforts of the rough road were increased with
the general, by his travelling with some degree of state in a chariot
which he had purchased of Governor Sharpe. In this he arrived at Fort
Cumberland, amid a thundering salute of seventeen guns. By this time
the general discovered that he was not in a region fitted for such
display, and his travelling cha