and on the book that stood open on the altar and
kissed the hilt of his sword. "I will keep the faith," said he. At dawn
he went his way again, and no one knew his name, but when the fires of
battle lighted the western world America looked to him for its
deliverance from tyranny. Years later it was this spot that he revisited,
alone, to pray, and here Sir William Howe offered to him, in the name of
his king, the title of regent of America. He took the parchment and
ground it into a rag in the earth at his feet. For this was Washington.
MARION

Blooming and maidenly, though she dressed in leather and used a rifle
like a man, was Marion, grand-daughter of old Abraham, who counted his
years as ninety, and who for many of those years had lived with his books
in the tidy cabin where the Youghiogheny and Monongahela come together.
This place stood near the trail along which Braddock marched to his
defeat, and it was one of the stragglers from this command, a bony
half-breed with red hair, called Red Wolf, that knocked at the door and
asked for water. Seeing no one but Marion he ventured in, and would have
tried not only to make free with the contents of the little house but
would have kissed the girl as well, only that she seized her rifle and
held him at bay. Still, the fellow would have braved a shot, had not a
young officer in a silver-laced uniform glanced through the open door in
passing and discovered the situation. He doffed his chapeau to Marion,
then said sternly to the rogue, "Retire. Your men are waiting for you."
Red Wolf slunk away, and Washington, for it was he, begged that he might
rest for a little time under the roof.

This request was gladly complied with, both by the girl and by her
grandfather, who presently appeared, and the fever that threatened the
young soldier was averted by a day of careful nursing. Marion's innate
refinement, her gentleness, her vivacity, could not fail to interest
Washington, and the vision of her face was with him for many a day. He
promised to return, then he rode forward and caught up with the troops.
He survived the battle in which seven hundred of his comrades were shot
or tomahawked and scalped. One Indian fired at him eleven times, and five
of the bullets scratched him; after that the savage forbore, believing
that the officer was under Manitou's protection. When the retreating
column approached the place where Marion lived he hastened on in advance
to see her. The cabin wa