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Rh defeat by the Monongahela it had never been used except by small parties on foot and had become well-nigh impassable otherwise. We do not know what Washington wrote in the letter which Forbes so roundly criticised, but it can easily be conceived, without detriment to his character, that he might have spoken in a way Forbes could not understand concerning lethargic Pennsylvania's undeserved good fortune. But Forbes had the present to deal with, not the past, and the shortest route to the Ohio was all too long.

This became alarmingly plain in a very short time after the day, August 1, on