But the time for marching to Boston had not quite come.
The delegates from the different colonies met in Carpenter's Hall, in Philadelphia, on the 5th of September, 1774. Their meeting has since been known as the First Continental Congress of America.
For fifty-one days those wise, thoughtful men discussed the great question that had brought them together. What could the colonists do to escape the oppressive laws that the King of England was trying to force upon them?
Many powerful speeches were made, but George Washington sat silent. He was a doer rather than a talker.
At last the Congress decided to send an address to the king to remind him of the rights of the colonists, and humbly beg that he would not enforce his unjust laws.
And then, when all had been done that could be done, Washington went back to his home at Mount Vernon, to his family and his friends, his big plantations, his fox-hunting, and his pleasant life as a country gentleman.
But he knew as well as any man that more serious work was near at hand.
* * * * *
XII.—THE BEGINNING OF THE WAR.
All that winter the people of the colonies were anxious and fearful. Would the king pay any heed to their petition? Or would he force them to obey his unjust laws?