It would seem that such suggestions would be obvious to any man of ordinary intelligence. General Braddock, with a smile of incredulity and contempt, listened to these warnings of his youthful aide, and politely intimated that a Major-General in the regular army of his majesty the king of Great Britain was not to be taught the art of war by a young American provincial, who had never seen even the inside of a military school. When the army commenced its march from Fort Cumberland, Washington was quite dazzled by the brilliance of the scene. He declares it to have been the most beautiful and inspiriting spectacle he had ever beheld. The British troops were dressed in full and gaudy uniform. They were arranged in columns, and marched with precision of drill such as Washington had never seen before. The beams of the unclouded sun were reflected from silken banners and burnished arms, while well-trained musical bands caused the forests to resound with their martial strains. The officers were mounted on prancing steeds, in the highest condition. The river flowed tranquilly by, an emblem, not of horrid war, but of peaceful, opulent, and happy homes. All were inspirited with hope and confidence. Such was the commencement of the campaign. How different the scene presented, when, at the close of a few weeks, the fragments of this army returned, bleeding, exhausted, starving--a struggling band of fugitives, one half of their number having been killed and scalped by the Indians. Washington soon became convinced of the incapacity of General Braddock to conduct such an enterprise as that upon which he had entered. He writes:[37] “I found that, instead of pushing on with vigor, without regarding a little rough road, they were halting to level every mole-hill, and to erect bridges over every brook, by which means we were four days in getting twelve miles.”[38] On one occasion Washington said, “If our march is to be regulated by the slow movements of the train, it will be very tedious.” Braddock smiled contemptuously at this indication of the ignorance of the young American officer in reference to the march of armies. Without encountering any opposition, the army surmounted the rugged acclivities, and threaded the long defiles of the mountains, until, from the dreary expanse, they entered upon the luxuriant, blooming, magnificent valley of apparently boundless reach beyond. This successful passage of the mountains inspired Major-General Braddock with renewed self-confidence. His deportment said, every hour, to his youthful American aid, “You see that a British officer cannot be instructed in the art of war by a young Virginian.”