The circumstances which attended the appointment of Washington to this great command are now quite well known. He had been a member of the Congress of 1774, and his military experience and accomplishments, and the great resources of his character, had caused his appointment on all the committees charged with making preparations for the defence of the colonies. Returned as a delegate from Virginia to the Congress of 1775, his personal qualifications pointed him out as the fittest person in the whole country to be invested with the command of any army which the United Colonies might see fit to raise; and it is quite certain that there would have been no hesitation about the appointment, if some political considerations had not been suggested as obstacles. At the moment when the choice was to be made, the scene of actual operations was in Massachusetts, where an army composed of troops wholly raised by the New England colonies, and under the command of General Ward, of that Province, was besieging the enemy in Boston. This army was to be adopted by the Congress into the service of the continent, and serious doubts were entertained by some of the members of the Congress as to the policy of appointing a Southern general to the command of it, and a good deal of delicacy was felt on account of General Ward, who, it was thought, might consider himself injured by such an appointment. On the other hand, there were strong reasons for selecting a general-in-chief from Virginia. That colony had taken the lead, among the Southern provinces, in the cause of the continent, and the appointment seemed to be due to her, if it was to be made upon political considerations. The motives for this policy were deemed sufficient to outweigh the objections arising from the character and situation of the army which the general would, in the first instance, have to command. But after all, it cannot be doubted, that the preëminent qualifications of Washington had far more weight with the majority of the Congress, than any dictates of mere policy, between one part of the Union and another, or any local jealousies or sectional ambition.