"Dear, dear!" sighed Lulu, "what a time poor Washington did have with
Congress being so slow, and officers under him so perverse, wanting
their own way instead of doing their best to help him to carry out his
good and wise plans."

"Yes," her father said, with a slight twinkle of fun in his eye, "but
doesn't my eldest daughter feel something like sympathy with them in
their wish to carry out their own plans without much regard for those of
other people?"

"I--I suppose perhaps I ought to, papa," she replied, blushing and
hanging her head rather shamefacedly; "and yet," she added, lifting it
again and smiling up into his eyes, "I do think if you had been the
commander over me I'd have tried to follow your directions, believing
you knew better than I."

She moved nearer to his side and leaned up lovingly against him as she
spoke.

"Yes, dear child, I feel quite sure of it," he returned, laying his hand
tenderly on her head, then smoothing her hair caressingly as he spoke.

"But you haven't finished about the second attack upon Fort Mifflin,
have you, brother Levis?" queried Walter.

"No, not quite," the captain answered; then went on with his narrative:

"All through the war Washington showed himself wonderfully patient and
hopeful, but it was with intense anxiety he now watched the progress of
the enemy in his designs upon Fort Mifflin, unable as he himself was to