Virginia, seeking space, must begin to grow
westward.
There were settlements from the sea to the Falls of the James, and upon the
York, the Rappahannock, and the Potomac. Beyond these, in the wilderness,
might be found a few lonely cabins, a scattered handful of pioneer folk,
small blockhouses, and small companies of rangers charged with protecting
all from Indian foray. All this country was rolling and hilly, but beyond
it stood the mountains, a wall of enchantment, against the west.
Alexander Spotswood, hardy Scot, endowed with a good temperamental blend of
the imaginative and the active, was just the man, the time being ripe, to
encounter and surmount that wall. Fortunately, too, the Virginians were
horsemen, man and horse one piece almost, New World centaurs. They would
follow the bridle-tracks that pierced to the hilly country, and beyond that
they might yet make way through the primeval forest. They would encounter
dangers, but hardly the old perils of seacoast and foothills. Different,
indeed, is this adventure of the Governor of Virginia and his chosen band
from the old push afoot into frowning hostile woods by the men of a hundred
and odd years before!
Spotswood rode westward with a company drawn largely from the colonial
gentry, men young in body or in spirit, gay and adventurous. The whole
expedition was conceived and executed in a key both humorous and knightly.
These "Knights"* set face toward the mountains in August, 1716. They had
guides who knew the upcountry, a certain number of rangers used to Indian
ways, and servants with food and much wine in their charge.
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