Part 3

All this happened in October, 1743, and was the means of making a useful change in my life and ways. At about this time my two brothers came together to visit us, in order to satisfy my mother’s complaints that she was never so poor and, since my father died, was not ever considered. It seems that at this time she was, as she remained until death, a dissatisfied woman, although never without sufficient income. She was, I fear, born discontented, and could not help it; for happiness depends more on the internal frame of a person’s mind than on the externals in this world.

VII

While matters concerning the estate were being discussed, Lawrence soon discovered so much of my too great freedom that he and my half-brother Augustine insisted that I go to live for a time with the latter, near to whose abode was a good school. My mother wept and protested, but at last agreed, with impatience, that I might go if I wished to do so. Of this Lawrence felt secure, for he had promised me a horse for myself and clothes to come from London, especially a red coat. I have always had a fancy for being well clothed; and as I was less well dressed than other gentlemen’s sons, the idea of a scarlet coat, and the promise of spurs when I had learned to ride better, settled my mind. I liked very well the great liberty I had, and to part with this and my playfellows I was not inclined; but I felt, as a boy does, that I was being made of importance, which pleases mankind at all times of life. I may say, also, that I was become more grave than most of my years, and was curious to see Williamsburg, where lived the king’s governor, and something beyond our plantation.

I remember that George Fairfax insisted once that no action ever grew out of only one motive, and, as I see, there were several made me willing to leave my home. Thus when Lawrence talked to me of his wars, and of his friends the Fairfaxes, and of how I must also soon visit him at Mount Vernon, I readily agreed to his wishes. It was hard to part with Betty, who looked like me until I had the smallpox, and with my dear brother Jack; but I was eager, as the day came, to see the outside world, and I rode away very content, on a gray mare with one black fore foot, beside Augustine, and my man Peter after us.

It was a long ride across the neck and down to Pope’s Creek on the Potomac, and I was a tired lad when we rode at evening up to the door of the house of Wakefield, where I was born eleven years before.

Here began a new life for me. Anne Aylett, Mrs. Augustine Washington, was a kind woman, very orderly in her ways, and handsome. After two days Peter was sent home, and I was allowed to ride alone to a Mr. Williams’s school at Oak Grove, four miles away.

I took very easily to arithmetic, and, later, to mathematic studies. I remember with what pleasure and pride I accompanied Mr. Williams when he went to survey some meadows on Bridges’ Creek. To discover that what could be learned at school might be turned to use in setting out the bounds of land, gave me the utmost satisfaction. I have always had this predilection for such knowledge as can be put to practical uses, and was never weary of tramping after my teacher, which much surprised my sister-in-law. I took less readily to geography and history. Some effort was made (but this was later) to instruct me in the rudiments of Latin, but it was not kept up, and a phrase or two I found wrote later in a copybook is all that remains to me of that tongue.

I much regret that I never learned to spell very well or to write English with elegance. As the years went by, I improved as to both defects, through incessant care on my part and copying my letters over and over. Great skill in the use of language I have never possessed, but I have always been able to make my meaning so plain in what I wrote that no one could fail to understand what I desired to make known.

I have always been willing to confess my lack of early education, but notwithstanding have been better able to present my reasons on paper than by word of mouth. I am aware, as I have said, that, except in the chase or in battle, my mind moves slowly, but I am further satisfied that under peaceful circumstances my final capacity to judge and act is quite as good as that of men who, like General Hamilton, were my superiours in power to express themselves. I may add that I learned early to write a clear and very legible hand. As to spelling, my mother’s was the worst I ever saw, and I believe King George was no better at it than I, his namesake. This just now reminds me that I may have been named after his grandfather, King George II, for George was not a family name, and, as we were very loyal people, it may have been so.

It was usual in those days to give to children names long in use in a family. John, Augustine, and Lawrence, for males, were repeated among us, and Mildred and Harriott; but I never heard of a George Washington before me, nor of any George in our descent, except my grandmother’s grandfather, the Hon. George Reade of his Majesty’s council in 1657. General Hamilton at one time interested himself in this matter, but I could make no satisfactory answer. I suppose my mother knew. I never thought to ask her. General Hamilton made merry over the idea of how much it would have gratified his present Majesty to have known of his grandfather being thus honoured.

Indeed, it pleased Mr. Duane, when maligning me, to call me Georgius Rex, but of this I apprehend that I have said enough. It is of no importance.

Outside of my school, the life at Wakefield was well suited to a lad of spirit. There were thirty horses in the stables, and some of them well bred and had won races at Williamsburg.

The waters of Pope’s Creek, where the Potomac tides rush in at flood and out at ebb through a narrow outlet of the creek, were full of crabs, oysters, clams, and fish. One of the slaves, named Appleby after August’s school, was engaged in the supply of fish, which the many negroes and the family needed. I think there were, at the least, seventy blacks. Being permitted to go on the water with Appleby, I found much satisfaction in sailing and rowing and the search for shell-fish. My brother August once surprised me by saying that some day the bottom of the Bay of Chesapeake would be a richer mine, on account of the oysters, than my brother Lawrence’s iron-mines, by which we all set great store. This may some day come to pass. The quantities of shad took in April and May were enough to feed an army, and what we did not eat went to feed the land.

In the autumn I was sometimes allowed to sit with August in a wattled blind, behind brush, while at dawning of day he shot the ducks, geese, and swans which flew over the little islands of Pope’s Creek in great flocks.

I prospered in this hardy life and grew strong and able to endure, nor was it less good for me in other ways; for, although I cared very little for August’s fiddling, nor to hear Anne sing, nor for the books, of which there was a fair supply, I admired August so much that I began, as some lads will do, to imitate his ways of doing things. And this was of use to me, for August was very courteous and mild-spoken to people of all classes, and much beloved by his slaves, to whom he was a gentle and considerate master.

The country along the Potomac was well settled with families of gentry, and visits were made by rowboats, so that I found very soon boy companions, although Belvoir, where the Fairfaxes lived, and Mount Vernon, rebuilt in 1742, being remote, were less frequently visited.

The church at Oak Grove was the better attended, and few persons were presented or admonished for non-attendance, because on Sunday, as many drove long distances, provisions were brought, and in the oak grove near by, between services, there was a kind of picnic, very pleasant to the younger people.

VIII

Soon after going to live for a season at Wakefield with Augustine, I began to take myself more seriously than is common in boys of my age. I believe I have all my life been regarded as grave and reserved, although, in fact, a part of this was due to a certain shyness, which I never entirely overcame, and of which I have already written. My new schoolmaster, Mr. Williams, gave me a book which I still have, and which here, and later at Mount Vernon, was of use to me. It was called the “Youth’s Companion.” It contained receipts, directions for conduct and manners, how to write letters, and, what most pleased me, methods of surveying land by Gunter’s rule, and all manner of problems in arithmetic and mathematics, as well as methods of writing deeds and conveyances. Young as I was, it suited well the practical side of my nature; for how to do things, and the doing of them so as to reach practical results, have never ceased to please me.

My mother’s natural desire for my presence wore out the patience of Augustine, and I was at last, after some months (but I do not remember exactly how long), sent back to her and to a school kept by the Rev. James Marye, a gentleman of Huguenot descent, at Fredericksburg, and from whom I might have learned French. My father had been desirous, I know not why, that I should learn that language; but this I never did, to my regret. I should have been saved some calumny, as I shall mention, and later also inconvenience, when I had to deal with French officers during the great war. I had then to make use of Mr. Duponceau and of Lieutenant-Colonel Hugh Wynne of my staff, but had been better served by G. W. had I known the French tongue.

I was at this time about fourteen, and was, as I said, a rather grave lad. I was industrious as to what I liked, but fond of horses and the chase, and was big of my years, masterful, and of more than common bodily strength.

I was not more unfortunate than most other young Virginians in regard to education. Governor Spottiswood, as I have heard, found no members of the majority in the House who could spell correctly or write so as to state clearly their grievances. There were persons, like the late Colonel Byrd, who were exceptions, but these were usually such as had been abroad. Patrick Henry, long after this time, observed to my sister that, even if we Virginians had little education, Mother Wit was better than Mother Country, for the gentlemen who came back brought home more vices than virtues. In fact, this may have been my father’s opinion; for, although he sent Lawrence and Augustine to the Appleby School in England, he would not allow of any long residence in London, where, he said, “men’s manners are finished, but so, too, are their virtues.”

For a few months in the next year I spent about half of the time with my mother. While there I studied, as before, at the school kept by the Rev. Mr. Marye. The rest of the time was spent in the company of Lawrence and his lady at Mount Vernon.

Lawrence was a tall man, narrow-chested, and less vigorous than Augustine. He was, however, fond of the chase and fox-hunting, and had books in larger number than was usual among planters. I remember him as very pleasing in his ways, and possessed of a certain reserve and gravity of demeanour, which, as my sister Betty Lewis remarked, made his rare expressions of affection more valuable.

He seemed to me the finest gentleman I ever knew, and I took to imitating him as my model, as I had done Augustine, which was at times matter for mirth to Anne, his wife. No doubt it seemed ridiculous, but it was, I do believe, of use to me.

As I write, I recall with unceasing gratitude the great debt I owe to my brother’s care of me at this period of my life. I was encouraged when I was at Mount Vernon――as I was then for a time away from school――to keep up my studies, and I remember that I fell again with satisfaction upon the manual I just now spoke of. It is still in my possession, and my wife’s children once made themselves uncommon merry over the ill-made pictures I drew on the blank pages; but it was of use to me as no other book ever was.

I was early made to understand that I must do something to support myself. The few acres on the river Rappahannock were not to be mine until I became of age, and until then were my mother’s; indeed, I never took them from her. My brother disapproved of the easy, loose life of the younger sons of planters, and, of course, trade was not to be considered, nor to work as a clerk; and yet, without care, accuracy, and such business capacity as is needed by merchants, no man can hope to be successful, either as a planter or even in warfare.

Ever since I had been at Mr. Williams’s school, I had a liking for the surveying of land, and had later been allowed to further inform myself by attending upon Mr. Genn, the official surveyor of Westmoreland, a man very honest and most accurate. Indeed, I had so well learned this business that I became, to my great joy, of use to Lawrence and some of his neighbours, especially to William Fairfax, who had at first much doubt as to how far my skill might be trusted.

Meanwhile various occupations for me were considered and discussed by my elders. The sea was less favoured in Virginia than at the North; but many captains of merchant ships were in those days, like my father, of the better class, and my brothers, who saw in me no great promise, believed that if I went to sea as a sailor I might be helped in time to a ship, and have my share in the prosperous London trade.

Like many boys, I inclined to this life. I remind myself of it here because it has been said that I was intended at this time to serve the king as a midshipman, which was never the case. Meanwhile,――for this was an affair long talked about,――my mother’s brother, Joseph Ball, wrote to her from London, May 19, 1746, that the sea was a dog’s life, and, unless a lad had great influence, was a poor affair, and the navy no better. Upon this my mother wrote, offering various trifling objections, and at last hurried to Mount Vernon, and so prevailed by her tears that my small chest was brought back to land from a ship in the river.

My brother Lawrence comforted me in my disappointment, saying there were many roads in life, and that only one had been barred. I remember that I burst into tears, when once I was alone, and rushed off to the stables and got a horse, and rode away at a great pace. This has always done me good, and, somehow, settled my mind; for I have never felt, as I believe a Latin writer said, that care sits behind a horseman. I jolted mine off, but for days would not have any one talk to me of the matter. Even as a lad, I had unwillingness to recur to a thing when once it was concluded, and that is so to this day.

IX

The summer passed away in sport and in visits to William Fairfax, who lived below us on the river. Here I saw much good society, among others the Masons, Carys, and Lees, and formed an attachment to William Fairfax, the master of Belvoir, and his son George, which was never broken, although we came long after to differ in regard to our political views. But of this, and of his cousin, Lord Fairfax, more hereafter. In the fall of this year I returned to my mother, or rather, as before, I went to board across the Rappahannock at Fredericksburg, in the house of a widow of the name of Stevenson, which she pronounced Stinson. She had, by her two marriages, six sons, two of them Crawfords and four Stevensons. They were all well-grown fellows, and of great strength and bigness.

I am reminded, as I set down in a random way what interests me, that, as I expected, this act of attention brings to mind some things which I seemed to have altogether forgotten. Among them is this, that, just before returning to my school, I went with Lawrence to pay my respects to Lord Fairfax, who was come for a visit to his cousin at Belvoir. We found the family, however, in sudden distress at the news, just arrived, of the death in battle of Thomas, the second son, who was killed in the Indies, in an engagement on board his Majesty’s ship _Harwich_. We made, on this account, but a short stay. I remember that, as we rode away, Lawrence said to me: “A great preacher called Jeremy Taylor wrote a sermon about death, and gave a long list of the many ways of dying. Which way, George, would you wish to die?” I said I did not wish to die at all.

Lawrence said: “But you will die some day. What way would you choose?” I said I thought to die in battle would be best, and I said this because I remembered with horror watching how my father died and how greatly he suffered.

Lawrence said: “The good preacher did not speak of that way to die.” Now, as I write, being in years, it seems that not in that way shall I die, nor does it matter.

After this I went back to my mother, or rather to the town of Fredericksburg. I liked it the more because Colonel Harry Willis lived there. He married first my aunt Mildred, and second my cousin Mildred, so that I had about me many cousins, with also Warners and Thorntons of my kindred.

I was here fortunate in my teacher, of whom I have spoken before. This gentleman, the Rev. James Marye, was very different in his ways from some of the clergy put upon us by the Bishop of London, hard-drinking, ill-mannered men. Mr. Marye was got for St. George’s parish, on a petition of the vestry to Governor Gooch. He was rector thirty years, and was succeeded by his son.

On Sunday, as was quite common in Virginia, the girls and boys were heard the catechism by the rector, and those who did well were rewarded from time to time――the girls with pincushions and the boys with trap-balls.

The sons of the widow in whose house I lodged during the week were, as I have said, rough, big fellows who damaged a great deal the pride I had in my strength, because among them, for the first time as concerned lads of near my years, I met my match in wrestling and jumping, and what we called the Indian hug. Almost all of them served under me in the war, and one, William Crawford, rose to be a colonel and perished miserably, being burned at Sandusky in the war with the Indians, after their cruel way.

The Rev. Mr. Marye concerned himself more than the ordinary schoolmaster with the manners of his scholars. I may have been inclined beyond most lads to value his rules of courtesy and decent behaviour, for I kept the book in which I was made to copy the one hundred and eighteen precepts he taught us. I conceive them to have been of service to me and to others. I find the mice have gnawed and eaten a part of these rules. When, of late, I showed them to my sister Betty, she said she hoped eating of them would make the mice polite, for she was dreadfully afraid of those little vermin.

In this manner my next two years passed by. During this time I became still further attracted by the exactness and interest of the surveying of land, which I carried on without present thought of gain. I used to ride into the woods, and, leaving my horse tied, make use of Peter as a chain-bearer. Sometimes my cousins went with me, especially Lewis Willis, my schoolmate. But they soon grew tired and went to bird-nesting, or digging up of woodchucks, or to making the “praying-mantis” bugs fight one another. I never had much inclination towards games which had no distinct or lasting result. At any time I preferred for my play to fish or shoot, when allowed, or to measure lands and plot them.

Any work demanding strict method is good for a lad, and I found in surveys an education of value and one suited to my tastes, which never very much inclined to discover happiness in constant intercourse with my fellow-men, nor in much reading of books.

X

At the age of fifteen, in the fall of 1747, I went once more, for a time, to reside with Lawrence at Mount Vernon, where it was to be finally determined what I should do for a livelihood. As I look back on this period of my life, I perceive that it was the occasion of many changes. I saw much more of George William Fairfax and George Mason, ever since my friends, and was often with George’s father, the master of Belvoir, only four miles from Mount Vernon.

There came often, for long visits, William’s cousin, Lord Fairfax, over whose great estates in the valley William was the agent. I learned later that when first his lordship saw me he pronounced me to be a too sober little prig――and this, no doubt, I was; but after a time, when he came to overcome my shyness, he began to show such interest in me as flattered my pride and pleased my brother Lawrence. At this period Lord Fairfax was a tall man and gaunt, very ruddy and near-sighted.

It was natural that as a lad I should be pleased by the notice this gentleman, the only nobleman I had ever seen, began to take of me. My fondness for surveying he took more seriously than did my own people, and told me once it was a noble business, because it had to be truthful, and because it kept a man away from men and, especially, from women. I did not then understand what he meant, and did not think it proper to inquire.

I owed to this gentleman opportunities which led on to others, and to no one else have I been more indebted. I trust and believe that I let go no chance in after life to serve this admirable family.

True friendship is a plant of slow growth, and must undergo and withstand the shocks of adversity before it is entitled to the appellation. In fact, much disaster has befallen these friends, from whom politics and distance have separated me without weakening my gratitude or affection.

It has often happened to me to learn that I am thought to be a cold man, but this I believe to be untrue; for though I am, as concerns social intercourse and freedom of speech, a man reserved by nature, I discover in myself a great freedom to express myself affectionately on paper――nor do I conceive that I am unlike others in feeling the loss of the many friends whom distance or death has separated from me. But I will not repine; I have had my day.

As my brother was aware of the advantage it might be to me to secure the good will of the Fairfaxes, I was encouraged to visit Belvoir often, and thus was given me the chance to be, when he chose, in the company of his lordship, who was at this time a frequent guest at Belvoir with his cousins, and now and then at Mount Vernon.

The company of these gentlemen was of much value to me, and in all ways useful. William Fairfax was a man of honour and great probity; also very courteous. He had seen service in both Indies, and had divers adventures in clearing the pirates out of New Providence, all of which I was delighted to hear of, and he to relate. He had lived as a collector of customs in the New England colonies, having taken a wife at Salem, and had a greater respect for them than was common in Virginia. Indeed, in those days our planters despised the men of the North as mere traders and Puritans, while they, in their turn, considered us godless, drunken, fox-hunting squires, out of which prejudices arose, during the great war, many jealousies and troubles, of which, God knows, there were enough without these.