The governor found no one so well fitted for this mission as George Washington. It was a difficult piece of work. It meant a journey of not less than 560 miles, principally through a region that was neither quite uninhabited nor peopled by Indian tribes of uncertain temper. An advantage in the negotiations was only to be gained by conducting them with the utmost circumspection and courage. Washington did not refuse the office which the governor had offered him, although he clearly recognized the difficulties of the mission. He immediately prepared for the eventful journey. As companions he had, besides his fencing master, an interpreter and four frontiersmen, of whom two were Indian traders. The journey was begun during the raw November days of 1753. The progress of the little company was much impeded by storms and snow. They had to ford streams and cross rivers on quickly improvised rafts. As they were nearing their goal, they met with Indians who were friendly to the English. One chief told them that he had explained to the French commander in a speech that the French had no right to take possession of the land. Of course the chief had not written his discourse, but he had preserved it, word for word, in his memory and could repeat it for Washington, who had the interpreter translate it for him, and he wrote it all down in his diary. As the speech is a very characteristic one, we shall give a part of it here. (Remember that it was addressed to the French commander.) “Fathers,” said he, “you are disturbers of this land by building towns and taking it from us, by fraud or force. We kindled a fire long ago at Montreal, where we desired you to stay, and not to come and intrude upon our country. I now advise you to return thither, for this land is ours. If you had come in a peaceable manner, like our brothers the English, we should have traded with you as we do with them; but that you should come and take our possessions by force and build houses upon them is what we cannot submit to. Both you and the English are white. We live in a region between you both. The land belongs to neither of you. The Great Spirit allotted it to us as a home. So I desire you, as I have desired our brothers, the English, to withdraw, for I will keep you both at arm’s length. Whoever most regards this request, by them we will stand and consider them friends. Our brothers, the English, have heard this, and I now come to tell it to you.”