g a reformation.
Through his great and persevering efforts, an act was passed in the
Virginia Legislature giving prompt operation to court-martial;
punishing insubordination, mutiny and desertion with adequate
severity; strengthening the authority of a commander, so as to enable
him to enforce order and discipline among officers as well as
privates; and to avail himself, in time of emergency and for the
common safety, of the means and services of individuals. In
disciplining his men, they were instructed not merely in ordinary and
regular tactics, but in all the strategy of Indian warfare, and what
is called "bush-fighting"--a knowledge indispensable in the wild wars
of the wilderness. Stockaded forts, too, were constructed at various
points, as places of refuge and defence, in exposed neighborhoods.

His exertions, however, were impeded by one of those questions of
precedence which had so often annoyed him, arising from the difference
between crown and provincial commissions. Maryland, having by a scanty
appropriation raised a small militia force, stationed Captain
Dagworthy, with a company of thirty men, at Fort Cumberland, which
stood within the boundaries of that province. Dagworthy had served in
Canada in the preceding war, and had received a king's commission.
This he had since commuted for half-pay, and, of course, had virtually
parted with its privileges. He was nothing more, therefore, than a
Maryland provincial captain, at the head of thirty men. He now,
however, assumed to act under his royal commission, and refused to
obey the orders of any officer, however high his rank, who merely held
his commission from a governor. Nay, when Governor, or rather Colonel
Innes, who commanded at the fort, was called away to North Carolina by
his private affairs, the captain took upon himself the command and
insisted upon it as his right.

Parties instantly arose, and quarrels ensued among the inferior
officers; grave questions were agitated between the Governors of
Maryland and Virginia as to the fort itself; the former claiming it as
within his province, the latter insisting that, as it had been built
according to orders sent by the king, it was the king's fort, and
could not be subject to the authority of Maryland.

Washington refrained from mingling in this dispute; but intimated that
if the commander-in-chief of the forces of Virginia must yield
precedence to a Maryland captain of thirty men, he should have to
resig