“Make way,” said the people, “make way for age!”
An old man appeared, the patriarch of the place. He entered the house without speaking a word. He looked into the face of Washington and stood silent. There had come to him the moment that he had hoped to see; the desire and probably prayers of fading years had been answered. The room became still.
The old man did not ask an introduction to the great commander. He lifted his face upward and raised his hands. Then he spoke, not to Washington and his generals, but to God:
“Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation.”
The generals rode on toward Virginia, cheered by the spirit of prophecy in the patriarch’s prayer.
It was a little episode, but the soul of destiny was in it.
October, with its refreshing shade of coolness, its harvest-fields and amber airs, was now at hand. Cornwallis was surrounded at Yorktown. He had warned Sir Henry Clinton, his superior, that this might be his fate. He is lost who has lost his faith, and begins to make the provision to say, “I told you so!”
Knox with his siege-guns, twenty-three in number, was preparing for the final tempest of the war.
And against Yorktown were marching the heroes of the old liberty banners of Auvergne sans tache.