HOW TO GET STRONG
and forging the Father of the Republic into shape for his mighty task, ought to down one who was scarcely more than a growing boy, though large for his years. But he kept them busy. And then, for seven years, in the French and Indian War, hardly sitting down all day, save in the saddle; constantly exposed to privation, hardship, or danger; always in the thickest of the fight; horses shot under him; his clothes riddled till he seemed to lead a charmed life; and Bancroft well said: "No one ever, at any moment of his life, discerned in him the least shrinking in danger; and he had a hardihood in daring which escaped notice, because it was so developed by superior calmness and wisdom." This was the training of Washington. No wonder he had square sides. That wrestling; that running, jumping, hard riding, and Indian-fighting would help square any man's sides. Those ten years made George Washington; and no college or university in this land has ever turned out his equal physically, of whose deeds there is any Record. Had the best sparring-master of to-day spent those three years there, with Washington and the Stevensons, and taught them his art until they had mastered it; as Washington always mastered everything he touched; and could Washington at twenty-six have met John L. Sullivan at twenty-six in a finish glove-contest, the chances are at least even that the winner would not have been Sullivan. Include wrestling as well as boxing; and long before the end of the bout, as he felt those mighty legs—better ones than his—twine around him, and found his feet—put them where he would—somehow always slipping out from under him; he would very likely have asked the Father of his Country if he had not once told people to "beware of entangling alliances"; and have concluded
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