unted with ten four-pounders, and some swivels; and
contained magazines and barracks. A prosperous town has arisen on the
spot.

The North Carolina troops at Winchester, not duly receiving their pay,
disbanded themselves in a disorderly way, and returned home. Dinwiddie
wrote to the board of trade that "the progress of the French would
never be effectually opposed, but by means of an act of parliament
compelling the colonies to contribute to the common cause independently
of assemblies;" and to the secretary of state: "I know of no method to
compel them to their duty to the king, but by an act of parliament for a
general poll-tax of two shillings and six pence a head, from all the
colonies on this continent." This scheme had been suggested a long time
before.

In 1738 the assembly of Virginia, which had long exercised the right of
choosing a treasurer, had placed their speaker, John Robinson, in that
office; and he continuing to hold both places for many years, exerted an
undue influence over the assembly by lending the public money to the
members. Dinwiddie ruled on ordinary occasions, but Robinson was
dictator in all extraordinary emergencies.[470:A]

When the assembly met in October, 1754, they granted twenty thousand
pounds for the public exigencies; Maryland and New York also contributed
their quotas to the common cause; and Dinwiddie received ten thousand
pounds from England. He now enlarged the Virginia forces to ten
companies, under the pretext of peremptory orders from England, and made
each of them independent, with a view, as was alleged, of terminating
the disputes between the regular and provincial officers respecting
command. The effect of this upon Washington would have been to reduce
him to the grade of captain, and to subject him to officers whom he had
commanded; officers of the same rank, but holding the king's commission,
would rank before him. This would have been the more mortifying to him,
after the catastrophe of the Great Meadows. He, therefore, although his
inclinations were still strongly bent to arms, resigned, and passed the
winter at Mount Vernon. He was now twenty-two years of age.

In the meanwhile Horatio Sharpe, professionally a military man, and Lord
Baltimore's lieutenant-governor of Maryland, was appointed by the crown
commander-in-chief of the forces against the French. Colonel William
Fitzhugh, of Virginia, who was to command in the absence of Sharpe, had
endeavored to persuade