DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA, TO WIT. SEAL. BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the thirteenth day of February, in the twenty-eighth year of the Independence of the United States of America, CALEB P. WAYNE, of the said District, hath deposited in this Office the Title of a Book, the right whereof he claims as Proprietor, in the words following, to wit:.... "The Life of George Washington, Commander in Chief of the "American Forces, during the War which established the Indepen"dence of his country, and First President of the United States.... "Compiled under the inspection of the Honourable Bushrod Wash"ington, from original papers bequeathed to him by his deceased "Relative, and now in possession of the Author. To which is prefixed, an Introduction, containing a compendious View of the "Colonies planted by the English on the Continent of North Ame"rica, from their settlement to the commencement of that war which "terminated in their Independence. By JOHN MARSHALL." In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States entituled "An act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned....And also to the Act entituled "An act Supplementary to an Act entituled "An act for the encouragement of learning by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned, and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving, and etching historical and other prints." D. CALDWELL, Clerk of the PREFACE, BY THE AUTHOR. A DESIRE to know intimately those illustrious personages, who have performed a conspicuous part on the great theatre of the world, is, perhaps, implanted in every human bosom. We delight to follow them through the various critical and perilous situations in which they have been placed, to view them in the extremes of adverse and prosperous fortune, to trace their progress through all the difficulties they have surmounted, and to contemplate their whole conduct at a time when, the power and the pomp of office having disappeared, it may be presented to us in the simple garb of truth. If among those exalted characters which are produced in every age, none can have a fairer claim to the attention and recollection of mankind than those under whose auspices great empires have been founded, or political institutions deserving to be permanent, established; a faithful representation of the various important events connected with the life of the favourite Son of America, cannot be unworthy of the general regard. Among his own countrymen it will unquestionably excite the deepest interest. As if the chosen instrument of Heaven, selected for the purpose of effecting the great designs of Providence respecting this our western hemisphere, it was the peculiar lot of this distinguished man, at every epoch when the destinies of his country seemed dependent on the measures adopted, to be called by the united voice of his fellow citizens to those high stations on which the success of those measures principally depended. It was his peculiar lot to be equally useful in obtaining the independence, and consolidating the civil institutions, of his country. We perceive him at the head of her armies, during a most arduous and perilous war on the events of which her national existence was staked, supporting with invincible fortitude the unequal conflict. That war being happily terminated, and the political revolutions of America requiring that he should once more relinquish his beloved retirement, we find him guiding her councils with the same firmness, wisdom, and virtue, which had, long |