[Illustration:  PUTNAM’S FORT.  General Washington looking at the British Ships in Boston Harbor.]

When the British commander woke up the next morning, he saw the American cannon pointed at his ships.  He was so astonished that he could scarcely believe his eyes.  “Why,” said he, “the rebels have done more in one night than my whole army could have done in a week.”  Another officer, who had command of the British vessels, said, “If the Americans hold that fort, I cannot keep a ship in the harbor.”

Well, we know what happened.  Our men did hold that fort, and the British had to leave Boston.  Next to General Washington, General Rufus Putnam was the man who made them go; for not many officers in the American army could build such a fort as he could.

[Footnote 1:  Rufus Putnam was born in Sutton, Massachusetts.]

[Footnote 2:  Dorchester Heights:  now South Boston.]

170.  General Putnam builds the Mayflower; goes down the Ohio River and makes the first settlement in Ohio.—­After the war was over, General Putnam started with a company of people from New England, to make a settlement on the Ohio River.  In the spring of 1788 he and his emigrants built a boat at a place just above Pittsburg.[3] They named this boat the Mayflower,[4] because they were Pilgrims going west to make their home there.

[Illustration:  EMIGRANTS IN THE Mayflower.]

At that time there was not a white settler in what is now the state of Ohio.  Most of that country was covered with thick woods.  There were no roads through those woods, and there was not a steamboat or a railroad either in America or in the world.  If you look on the map[5] and follow down the Ohio River from Pittsburg, you will come to a place where the Muskingum joins the Ohio.  At that place the Mayflower stopped, and the emigrants landed and began to build their settlement.

[Footnote 3:  Pittsburg:  see map in paragraph 140.]

[Footnote 4:  Mayflower:  see paragraph 64.]

[Footnote 5:  See map in paragraph 140.]

171.  What the settlers named their town; the first Fourth of July celebration; what Washington said of the settlers.—­During the Revolutionary War the beautiful Queen Mary of France was our firm friend, and she was very kind and helpful to Dr. Franklin when he went to France for us.  A number of the emigrants had fought in the Revolution, and so it was decided to name the town Marietta,[6] in honor of the queen.

When the Marietta settlers celebrated the Fourth of July, Major Denny, who commanded a fort just across the river, came to visit them.  He said, “These people appear to be the happiest folks in the world.”  President Washington said that he knew many of them and that he believed they were just the kind of men to succeed.  He was right; for these people, with those who came later to build the city of Cincinnati, were the ones who laid the foundation of the great and rich state of Ohio.