On the 14th, Washington was planning his homeward trip. His horses, lacking proper nourishment and exhausted by the hard trip northward, were totally unfit for service, and were at once set on the road to Venango, since canoes had been offered the little embassy for the return trip. Anxious as Washington was to be off, neither his business nor that of Half King's had been despatched with any celerity until now; but this day Half King secured an audience with St. Pierre and offered him the wampum which was promptly refused, though with many protestations of friendship and an offer to send a load of goods to Logstown. Every effort possible was being put forth to alienate Half King, and the Virginian lad frankly wrote: "I can't say that ever in my Life I suffered so much Anxiety as I did in this Affair." This day and the next, the French officers outdid themselves in hastening Washington's departure and retarding Half King's. At last Washington complained frankly to St. Pierre, who denied his duplicity--and doubled his bribes. But on the day following Half King was gotten away, Venango being reached in six long days, a large part of the time being spent dragging the canoes over icy shoals. Four days were spent with Joncaire, when, abandoning both horses and Indians, Washington and Gist set out alone and afoot by the shortest course to the Forks of the Ohio. It was a daring alternative but altogether the preferable one. At Murdering Town, a fit place for Joncaire's assassin to lie in wait, some French Indians were come up with, one of whom offered to guide the travelers across to the Forks. At the first good chance he fired upon them and was disarmed and sent away. The two, building a raft, reached an island in the Allegheny after heroic suffering, but were unable to cross to the eastern shore until the following morning. They then passed over on the ice which had formed and went directly to Frazier's cabin. There they arrived December 29th. On the first day of the new year, 1754, Washington set out for Virginia on the little path over which he had come out. On the sixth he met seventeen horses loaded with materials and stores "for a fort at the Fork of the _Ohio_." Governor Dinwiddie, indefatigable if nothing else, had commissioned Captain Trent to raise a company of a hundred men to erect a fort on the Ohio for the protection of the Ohio Company. On the 16th of January the youthful envoy rode again into Williamsburg, one month from the day he left Fort La Boeuf. St. Pierre's reply to Governor Dinwiddie's letter read as follows: "_Sir_, "As I have the Honour of commanding here in Chief, Mr. _Washington_ delivered me the Letter which you wrote to the Commandant of the _French_ Troops.