It is true Saul and I had heard now and then that even boys in Massachusetts and in New York were enrolled, or had agreed among themselves, to act as Minute Boys, ready to do whatsoever they might, at any time, regardless of all things else save the proving of that Declaration of Independence to the satisfaction of the whole wide world. It was on the day before the action at Spencer's Ordinary that I, Fitzroy Hamilton, and Saul, my cousin, met for the first time a little French lad by name of Pierre Laurens, who had come up from New Orleans with his widowed mother to visit at my home, after having spent a summer in Boston. A companionable sort of a lad was this little French boy who waved his hands and shrugged his shoulders when he talked, as if they were in some way connected with his tongue; one who was able to tell many an entertaining story, and who had seen so much of this land of America that it was to Saul and me as if he was some great traveler, while we were only two country louts, never having strayed a dozen miles from home. It is not of Pierre whom I have set myself down to tell; but it was necessary I should refer to him in order that you might understand how we two lads of James Town, who seldom went away from the plantation save to ride into the settlement, and whose longest journey had been from the James to the York river across that neck where one may best arrive at York Town, came to know that we might serve the Cause as Minute Boys. It was little Frenchie who took it upon himself to tell us what he knew, he having met several lads in Boston who called themselves Minute Boys. He held up before Saul and me pictures of the duty we owed our homes, as if we Virginians needed to be taught our duty, and painted in glowing colors the honor and glory which was to be won by those lads who stood ever ready to perform the work of Minute Boys, until we were quite aflame with the idea. I doubt much, however, whether anything would have come of it had it not been for that same engagement at Spencer's Ordinary, when Lieutenant-Colonel Simcoe, counting to ride over the Pennsylvania men under Colonel Butler as he had ridden over us Virginians, found much to his displeasure that it was not always possible for his high mightiness to do exactly as he wished. Do not get the idea that I intend to make it appear as if the king's troops were worsted at Spencer's Tavern; but it was a drawn battle, as I have heard even those who really loved the king, admit, and it must have been a startling surprise to the swaggering Simcoe to have received even a check.