t the siege of Norfolk, the battles of Brandywine,
Germantown, and Monmouth, and his share in the rigors of Valley Forge
and in the capture of Stony Point, made him an American before he
had ever had time to become a Virginian. As he himself wrote long
afterwards: "I had grown up at a time when the love of the Union and
the resistance to Great Britain were the inseparable inmates of the same
bosom;... when the maxim 'United we stand, divided we fall' was the
maxim of every orthodox American. And I had imbibed these sentiments so
thoroughly that they constituted a part of my being. I carried them with
me into the army, where I found myself associated with brave men from
different States, who were risking life and everything valuable in
a common cause believed by all to be most precious, and where I was
confirmed in the habit of considering America as my country and Congress
as my government."

Love of country, however, was not the only quality which soldiering
developed in Marshall. The cheerfulness and courage which illuminated
his patriotism brought him popularity among men. Though but a
lieutenant, he was presently made a deputy judge advocate. In this
position he displayed notable talent in adjusting differences between
officers and men and also became acquainted with Washington's brilliant
young secretary, Alexander Hamilton.

While still in active service in 1780, Marshall attended a course of law
lectures given by George Wythe at William and Mary College. He owed this
opportunity to Jefferson, who was then Governor of the State and who had
obtained the abolition of the chair of divinity at the college and the
introduction of a course in law and another in medicine. Whether
the future Chief Justice was prepared to take full advantage of the
opportunity thus offered is, however, a question. He had just fallen
heels over head in love with Mary Ambler, whom three years later he
married, and his notebook seems to show us that his thoughts were quite
as much upon his sweetheart as upon the lecturer's wisdom.

None the less, as soon as the Courts of Virginia reopened, upon the
capitulation of Cornwallis, Marshall hung out his shingle at Richmond
and began the practice of his profession. The new capital was still
hardly more than an outpost on the frontier, and conditions of living
were rude in the extreme. "The Capitol itself," we are told, "was an
ugly structure--'a mere wooden barn'--on an unlovely site at the foot