for weeks
at a time. A visitor noted that Washington spoke to his slaves with
a stern harshness. No doubt it was necessary. The management of this
intractable material brought training in command. If Washington could
make negroes efficient and farming pay in Virginia, he need hardly be
afraid to meet any other type of difficulty.

From the first he was satisfied that the colonies had before them a
difficult struggle. Many still refused to believe that there was
really a state of war. Lexington and Bunker Hill might be regarded as
unfortunate accidents to be explained away in an era of good feeling
when each side should acknowledge the merits of the other and apologize
for its own faults. Washington had few illusions of this kind. He took
the issue in a serious and even bitter spirit. He knew nothing of the
Englishman at home for he had never set foot outside of the colonies
except to visit Barbados with an invalid half-brother. Even then he
noted that the "gentleman inhabitants" whose "hospitality and genteel
behaviour" he admired were discontented with the tone of the officials
sent out from England. From early life Washington had seen much of
British officers in America. Some of them had been men of high birth and
station who treated the young colonial officer with due courtesy. When,
however, he had served on the staff of the unfortunate General Braddock
in the calamitous campaign of 1755, he had been offended by the tone of
that leader. Probably it was in these days that Washington first brooded
over the contrasts between the Englishman and the Virginian. With
obstinate complacency Braddock had disregarded Washington's counsels
of prudence. He showed arrogant confidence in his veteran troops and
contempt for the amateur soldiers of whom Washington was one. In a wild
country where rapid movement was the condition of success Braddock would
halt, as Washington said, "to level every mole hill and to erect bridges
over every brook." His transport was poor and Washington, a lover of
horses, chafed at what he called "vile management" of the horses by
the British soldier. When anything went wrong Braddock blamed, not the
ineffective work of his own men, but the supineness of Virginia. "He
looks upon the country," Washington wrote in wrath, "I believe, as void
of honour and honesty." The hour of trial came in the fight of July,
1755, when Braddock was defeated and killed on the march to the Ohio.
Washington told his mother t