But Mr. Pitt did not yet direct the councils of Britain; and a spirit
of enterprise and heroism did not yet animate her generals. The
campaign to the north was inglorious; and to the west, nothing was
even attempted, which might relieve the middle colonies.

{October 8.}

Large bodies of savages, in the service of France, once more spread
desolation and murder over the whole country, west of the Blue Ridge.
The regular troops were inadequate to the protection of the
inhabitants; and the incompetency of the defensive system to their
security became every day more apparent. "I exert every means," said
Colonel Washington, in a letter to Lieutenant Governor Dinwiddie, "to
protect a much distressed country; but it is a task too arduous. To
think of defending a frontier of more than three hundred and fifty
miles extent, as ours is, with only seven hundred men, is vain and
idle; especially when that frontier lies more contiguous to the enemy
than any other.

"I am, and for a long time have been, fully convinced, that if we
continue to pursue a defensive plan, the country must be inevitably
lost."

{October 24.}

In another letter he said, "The raising a company of rangers, or
augmenting our strength in some other manner, is so far necessary,
that, without it, the remaining inhabitants of this once fertile and
populous valley will scarcely be detained at their dwellings until the