"Come, gentlemen, gentlemen all,
Ginral Sincleer shall remem-ber-ed be,
For he lost thirteen hundred me-en all
In the Western Tari-to-ree."
Captain Lewis took a second look at the singer,—it was George Shannon standing on the dock.
"Why, Captain Lewis! Where are you going?"
George was an old friend of Meriwether's, and yet but a lad of seventeen. His father, one of those "ragged Continentals" that marched on Yorktown, had emigrated to the far Ohio.
Jane Shannon was a typical pioneer mother. She spun, wove, knit, made leggings of skins, and caps and moccasins, but through multitudinous duties found time to teach her children. "To prepare them for college," she said, "that is my dream. I'd live on hoe-cake for ever to give them a chance." Every one of her six boys inherited that mother's spirit, every one attained distinction.
At fourteen George was sent to his mother's relatives on the Monongahela to school. Here he met Lewis, forted in that winter camp. The gallant Virginian captured the boy's fancy,—he became his model, his ideal.
"And can you go?" asked Captain Lewis.