"Then the liberties of the country are safe!" exclaimed Washington. He remembered well the scenes under Braddock, and he knew what a sight it must have been to those New England farmers when a compact body of uniformed soldiers came marching up from the boats at Charlestown. If they could stand fearlessly, there was stuff in them for soldiers. [Illustration: "'DID THEY STAND THE FIRE OF THE REGULAR TROOPS?' ASKED WASHINGTON ANXIOUSLY."] All along the route the people in the towns turned out to see Washington's cavalcade, and at Newark a committee of the New York Provincial Congress met to escort him to the city. There he left General Schuyler in command, and hurried forward to Cambridge, for the news of Bunker Hill made him extremely anxious to reach the army. In New England, the nearer he came to the seat of war, the more excited and earnest he found the people. At every town he was met by the citizens and escorted through that place to the next. This was done at New Haven. The collegians all turned out, and they had a small band of music, at the head of which, curiously enough, was a freshman who afterward made some stir in the world. It was Noah Webster, the man of spelling-book and dictionary fame. At Springfield, the party was met by a committee of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, and at last, on the 2d of July, he came to Watertown, where he was welcomed by the Provincial Congress itself, which was in session there. It was about two o'clock in the afternoon of the same day that Washington rode into Cambridge, escorted by a company of citizens. As he drew near Cambridge Common, cannon were fired to welcome him, and the people in Boston must have wondered what had happened. The Provincial Congress had set apart for his use the house of the President of Harvard College, reserving only one room for the President; but this house, which is still standing, was probably too small and inconvenient; for shortly afterward Washington was established in the great square house, on the way to Watertown, which had been deserted by a rich Tory, and there he staid as long as he was in Cambridge. By good fortune, years afterward, the poet Longfellow bought the house, and so the two names of Washington and Longfellow have made it famous. On the morning of the next day, which was Monday, July 3, 1775, Washington, with Lee and other officers, rode into camp. Cambridge Common was not the little place it now is, hemmed in by streets. It stretched out toward the country, and a country road ran by its side, leading to Watertown. An Episcopal church stood opposite the common, and a little farther on, just as the road turned, nearly at a right angle, stood an old house. In front of this house, at the corner of the road, was a stout elm-tree. It was a warm summer morning, and the officers were glad of the shade of the tree.