From Farm House to the White House Part 36

"Yes, I think so," Mrs. Washington answered. "Look and see."

"They are strangers, surely," responded Washington, after a critical look towards the landing. "An oysterman's craft, I think."

"What should an oysterman come to our landing for?"

"We shall find out before long, no doubt," Washington replied.

It was at the landing where the family barge was tied up. The affluent planters kept beautiful barges, imported from England, for the use of their families. Washington had one, rowed by six negroes, wearing a kind of uniform of check shirts and black velvet caps.

They did find out very soon who the strangers were--an oysterman and his crew. They were a drunken, noisy rabble, who disturbed the neighborhood with their yells and revelry.

"They must be sent away," remarked Washington, as he hurried toward the landing. But they were not in a condition to listen to his counsels.

They were in the defiant state of intoxication, and refused to evacuate.

They declared themselves able and determined "to hold the fort."

The hero of Monongahela was not to be defied in that way. He adopted immediate measures to drive the mob away, but was not successful.

Finally, summoning his negroes, and organizing a campaign against them, he forced them to leave, though, Irving says, "It took a campaign of three days to expel these invaders from the premises."

At another time Washington was riding over his estate, when the report of a gun on the banks of the river, not far away, startled him. Turning his horse in the direction of the report, he soon discovered an interloper in a canoe, making havoc among the canvas-back ducks which were numerous on the river.

"Stranger," he called.

The hunter looked up.

"By what authority are you trespa.s.sing upon these grounds?"

The only reply that Washington received was, the hunter aimed his gun at him as if to fire. But the owner of Mount Vernon had seen guns pointed at him before; and, nothing daunted, he dashed into the river, shouting, "Fire if you dare!"

Seizing the painter of the canoe, he drew it to the sh.o.r.e; then, springing from his horse, he wrested the gun from the hands of the astonished hunter.

"I am the proprietor of this estate," he shouted, seizing the fellow by the nape of his neck and pulling him out of his canoe, "and we will see whose rights are to be regarded."

The hunter begged for mercy, promising to quit the grounds and never more trespa.s.s upon them. Washington restored his gun to him, and allowed him to depart without further punishment.

Mr. and Mrs. Washington were active and influential members of the Episcopal Church. Irving says:

"The Episcopal Church predominated throughout the 'Ancient Dominion,' as it was termed. Each county was divided into parishes, as in England, each with its parochial church, its parsonage, and glebe. Washington was vestryman of two parishes,--Fairfax and Truro. The parochial church of the former was at Alexandria, ten miles from Mount Vernon; of the latter, at Pohick, about seven miles. The church at Pohick was rebuilt on a plan of his own, and in a great measure at his expense. At one or other of these churches he attended every Sunday, when the weather and the roads permitted. His demeanor was reverential and devout. Mrs.

Washington knelt during the prayers; he always stood, as was the custom at that time."

One of Mrs. Washington's biographers says of her:

"It is recorded of this devout Christian that never, during her life, whether in prosperity or adversity, did she omit that daily self-communion and self-examination, and those private devotional exercises, which would best prepare her for the self-control and self denial by which she was, for more than half a century, so eminently distinguished. It was her habit to retire to her own apartment every morning after breakfast, there to devote an hour to solitary prayer and meditation."

Mount Vernon was a home of prayer, of course. The presence of guests, however distinguished, never modified the family devotions. These were among the essentials of good family government. In one of Washington's orders sent to England is the following:

"A small Bible, neatly bound in Turkey, and "John Parke Custis" wrote in gilt letters on the inside of the cover.

"A neat small prayer-book bound as above, with "John Parke Custis," as above."

The necessity of erecting a new house of worship was discussed in the vestry of Truro, and a vote in favor of the project was secured. On the location, the vestrymen were divided.

"The old site is the proper one," said Mr. George Mason, whose residence was near the house of worship.

"Not at all central," replied another.

"Yet not so far aside as to discommode any one," responded Mason.

"I beg leave to dissent from Mr. Mason," added a third. "The location is inconvenient for my family."

"The sacred a.s.sociations of the spot alone ought to keep the church there," urged Mr. Mason. "For generations our house of worship has stood there, and the place is hallowed by the sepulchres of our fathers around it."

The subject was discussed, pro and con, when Washington's opinion was asked. Without reserve he remarked:

"I cannot agree with my friend Mason that the location does not sensibly inconvenience some members of the parish. I think it does, and that a more central locality can be found. Neither can I see the force of his argument derived from the contiguity of the grave-yard. Churches are erected for the living, and not for the dead. The ashes of the dead can be sacredly protected by a suitable enclosure."

The vestry adjourned without deciding upon the location, and before the next meeting, Washington carefully surveyed the parish, and made a neat plan of the same, showing that the old location was far from the centre.

Mr. Mason urged with more earnestness than before the claims of the old site. But when Washington took his plan of survey from his pocket, and gave ocular demonstration that the old location was at one side of the parish, the new location was adopted at once.

Rev. Lee Ma.s.sey was rector of the church at that time, and he said of Washington:

"I never knew so constant an attendant on church as Washington. And his behavior in the house of G.o.d was ever so deeply reverential that it produced the happiest effects on my congregation, and greatly a.s.sisted me in my pulpit labors. No company ever kept him from church. I have often been at Mount Vernon on the Sabbath morning when his breakfast-table was filled with guests; but to him they furnished no pretext for neglecting his G.o.d and losing the satisfaction of setting a good example. For, instead of staying at home out of false complaisance to them, he used constantly to invite them to accompany him."

Mrs. Washington's daughter died in 1770, after a lingering and painful disease. It was a terrible blow to her; and how severe a blow it was to her husband may be learned from the following incident:

Coming into the room when his wife's face was buried in her hands, convulsed with grief, he burst into tears, kneeled beside the bed, and poured out his soul in a most fervent prayer that G.o.d would yet spare the dear girl for the sake of her mother, and for Christ's sake. She had already breathed her last a moment before he entered the room; but, in his great sympathy for his wife, and his own pa.s.sionate grief, the fact was unrecognized, and he sought relief in prayer.

The son was between sixteen and seventeen years of age when the daughter died, and was beginning to be a very wayward boy. He was sent to an Episcopal school at Annapolis, Maryland, where he attended to fox-hunting and other amus.e.m.e.nts more than he did to his studies. He fell in love, also, with Eleanor Calvert, daughter of Benedict Calvert of Mount Airy, and he entered into a matrimonial engagement with her.

Mrs. Washington was very much tried by the course of the young man, and, after canva.s.sing the whole subject carefully with her husband, he addressed a letter to Miss Calvert's father, which was a compliment alike to his head and heart. It was a very long letter, and we have s.p.a.ce for brief extracts only:

MOUNT VERNON, April 3, 1773.

"DEAR SIR,--I am now set down to write to you on a subject of importance, and of no small embarra.s.sment to me. My son-in-law and ward, Mr. Custis, has paid his addresses to your second daughter, and, having made some progress in her affections, has solicited her in marriage. How far a union of this sort may be agreeable to you, you best can tell; but I should think myself wanting in candor were I not to confess that Miss Nelly's amiable qualities are acknowledged on all hands, and that an alliance with your family will be pleasing to his.

"This acknowledgment being made, you must permit me to add sir, that at this, or in any short time, his youth, inexperience, and unripened education, are, and will be, insuperable obstacles, in my opinion, to the completion of the marriage. As his guardian, I consider it my indispensable duty to endeavor to carry him through a regular course of education, and to guard his youth to a more advanced age, before an event on which his own peace and the happiness of another are to depend, takes place....

"If the affection which they have avowed for each other is fixed upon a solid basis, it will receive no diminution in the course of two or three years, in which time he may prosecute his studies, and thereby render himself more deserving of the lady and useful to society. If, unfortunately, as they are both young, there should be an abatement of affection on either side, or both, it had better precede, than follow, marriage.

"Delivering my sentiments thus freely will not, I hope, lead you into a belief that I am desirous of breaking off the match. To postpone it is all I have in view; for I shall recommend to the young gentleman, with the warmth that becomes a man of honor, to consider himself as much engaged to your daughter as if the indissoluble knot was tied; and, as the surest means of affecting this, to apply himself closely to his studies, by which he will, in a great measure, avoid those little flirtations with other young ladies, that may, by dividing the attention, contribute not a little to divide the affections."

The result of this correspondence was that Washington took young Custis to King's (now Columbia) College, New York City, and entered him for two years. But love had so much more control of his heart than learning had of his head, that he remained there only a few months, when he returned to Mount Vernon, and was married to Miss Calvert on Feb. 3, 1774. The couple were nineteen and seventeen years of age, respectively, and their marriage proved a very fortunate event for themselves, and the families on both sides.

The following incident, ill.u.s.trative of Washington's fine personal appearance, transpired when he accompanied his step-son to New York. It is from the pen of Mr. Custis:

"It was boasted at the table of the British governor that a regiment, just landed from England, contained among its officers some of the finest specimens of martial elegance in his Majesty's service; in fact, the most superb-looking fellows ever landed upon the sh.o.r.es of the new World. 'I wager your excellency a pair of gloves,' said Mrs. Morris, an American lady, 'that I will show you a finer man in the procession to-morrow than your excellency can select from your famous regiment;'--'Done, madam!' replied the governor. The morrow came (the fourth of June), and the procession, in honor of the birthday of the king, advanced through Broadway to the strains of military music. As the troops filed before the governor, he pointed out to the lady several officers by name, claiming her admiration for their superior persons and brilliant equipments. In rear of the troops came a band of officers not on duty, colonial officers, and strangers of distinction. Immediately, on their approach, the attention of the governor was seen to be directed toward a tall and martial figure, that marched with grave and measured tread, apparently indifferent to the scene around him. The lady now archly observed, 'I perceive that your excellency's eyes are turned to the right object; what say you to your wager now, sir?'--'Lost, madam,'

replied the gallant governor; 'when I laid my wager I was not aware that Colonel Washington was in New York.'"

Washington kept his own books at the same time that he attended to the business of his vast estates. The same neatness, method, and accuracy characterized his accounts at Mount Vernon that characterized his writing books at Mr. Williams' school. They were models.