His habit of setting things down on paper was one that developed early. He kept a journal of his surveying experiences beyond the Blue Ridge in 1748, another of his trip to Barbadoes with his brother Lawrence in 1751-52, another of his trip to Fort Le Boeuf to warn out the French, and yet another of his Fort Necessity campaign. The words are often misspelled, many expressions are ungrammatical, but the handwriting is good and the judgments expressed, even those set down when he was only sixteen, are the mature judgments of a man.

A year after his marriage he began a formal diary, which he continued until June 19, 1775, the time of his appointment to command the army of the Revolution. He called it his Diary and later Where, & how my time is Spent. In it he entered the happenings of the day, his agricultural and other experiments, a record of his guests and also a detailed account of the weather.

His attention to this last matter was most particular. Often when away from home he would have a record kept and on his return would incorporate it into his book. Exactly what advantages he expected to derive therefrom are not apparent, though I presume that he hoped to draw conclusions as to the best time for planting crops. In reading it I was many times reminded of a Cleveland octogenarian who for fifty-seven years kept a record twice a day of the thermometer and barometer. Near the end of his life he brought the big ledgers to the Western Reserve Historical Society, and I happened to be present on the occasion. "You have studied the subject for a long time," I said to him. "Are there any conclusions you have been able to reach as a result of your investigation?" He thought a minute and passed a wrinkled hand across a wrinkled brow. "Nothing but this," he made answer, "that Cleveland weather is only constant in its inconstancy."

We would gladly exchange some of these meteorological details for further information about Washington's own personal doings and feelings. Of the latter the diaries reveal little. Washington was an objective man, above all in his papers. He sets down what happens and says little about causes, motives or mental impressions. When on his way to Yorktown to capture Cornwallis he visited his home for the first time in six weary years, yet merely recorded: "I reached my own Seat at Mount Vernon (distant 120 Miles from the Hd. of Elk) where I staid till the 12th."

Not a word of the emotions which that visit must have roused!

For almost six years after 1775 there is a gap in the diary, though for some months of 1780 he sets down the weather. On May I, 1781, he begins a new record, which he calls a Journal, and he expresses regret that he has not had time to keep one all the time. The subjects now considered are almost wholly military and the entries reveal a different man from that of 1775. The grammar is better, the vocabulary larger, the tone more elevated, the man himself is bigger and broader with an infinitely wider viewpoint.

From November 5, 1781, for more than three years there is another blank, except for the journal of his trip to his western lands already referred to. But on January 1, 1785, he begins a new Diary and thenceforward continues it, with short intermissions, until the day of his last ride over his estate.

A few of the diaries and journals have been lost, but most are still in existence. Some are in the Congressional Library and there also is the Toner transcript of these records. The transcript makes thirty-seven large volumes. The diary is one of the main sources from which the material for this book is drawn.

The original of the record of events for 1760 is a small book, perhaps eight or ten inches long by four inches wide and much yellowed by age. Part of the first entry stands thus:

"January 1, Tuesday

"Visited my Plantations and received an Instance of Mr. French's great Love of Money in disappointing me of some Pork because the price had risen to 22.6 after he had engaged to let me have it at 20 s."

On his return from his winter ride he found Mrs. Washington "broke out with the Meazles." Next day he states with evident disgust that he has taken the pork on French's own terms.

The weather record for 1760 was kept on blank pages of The Virginia Almanac, a compendium that contains directions for making "Indico," for curing bloody flux, for making "Physick as pleasant as a Dish of Chocolate," for making a striking sun-dial, also "A Receipt to keep one's self warm a whole Winter with a single Billet of Wood." To do this last "Take a Billet of Wood of a competent Size, fling it out of the Garret-Window into the Yard, run down Stairs as hard as ever you can drive; and when you have got it, run up again with it at the same Measure of Speed; and thus keep throwing down, and fetching up, till the Exercise shall have sufficiently heated you. This renew as often as Occasion shall require. Probatum est."

This receipt would seem worth preserving in this day of dear fuel. As Washington had great abundance of wood and plenty of negroes to cut it, he probably did not try the experiment—at least such a conclusion is what writers on historical method would call "a safe inference."



There is in the almanac a rhyme ridiculing physicians and above the March calendar are printed the touching verses:

"Thus of all Joy and happiness bereft, And with the Charge of Ten poor Children left: A greater Grief no Woman sure can know, Who,—with Ten Children—who will have me now."

Also there are some other verses, very broad and "not quite the proper thing," as Kipling has it. But it must not be inferred that Washington approved of them.

Washington also kept cash memorandum books, general account books, mill books and a special book in which he recorded his accounts with the estate of the Custis children. These old books, written in his neat legible hand, are not only one of our chief sources of information concerning his agricultural and financial affairs, but contain many sidelights upon historical events. It is extremely interesting, for example, to discover in one of the account books that in 1775 at Mount Vernon he lent General Charles Lee—of Monmouth fame—L15, and "to Ditto lent him on the Road from Phila to Cambridge at different times" L9.12 more, a total of L24.12. In later years Lee intrigued against Washington and said many spiteful things about him, but he never returned the loan. The account stood until 1786, when it was settled by Alexander White, Lee's executor.

In the Cash Memorandum books we can trace Washington's military preparations at the beginning of the Revolution. Thus on June 2, 1775, being then at Philadelphia, he enters: "By Expences bringing my Horses from Baltimore," L2.5. Next day he pays thirty pounds for "Cartouch Boxes &c. for Prince Wm. Comp." June 6, "By Covering my Holsters," L0.7.6; "By a Cersingle," L0.7.6; "By 5 Books—Military," L1.12.0. He was preparing for Gage and Howe and Cornwallis and whether the knowledge contained in the books was of value or not he somehow managed for eight years to hold his opponents at bay and ultimately to win. At Cambridge, July tenth, he spends three shillings and four pence for a "Ribbon to distinguish myself," that is to show his position as commander; also L1.2.6 for "a pair of Breeches for Will," his colored body servant.

A vast number of papers bear witness to his interest in agriculture and with these we are particularly concerned. He preserved most of the letters written to him and many of these deal with farming matters. During part of his career he had a copying press and kept copies of his own important letters, while many of the originals have been preserved, though widely scattered. When away from home he required his manager to send him elaborate weekly reports containing a meteorological table of each day's weather, the work done on each farm, what each person did, who was sick, losses and increases in stock, and other matters of interest. Scores of these reports are still in existence and are invaluable. He himself wrote—generally on Sunday—lengthy weekly letters of inquiry, direction, admonition and reproof, and if the manager failed in the minutest matter to give an account of some phase of the farm work, he would be sure to hear of it in the proprietor's next letter.

Washington's correspondence on agricultural matters with Arthur Young and Sir John Sinclair, eminent English agriculturists, was collected soon after his death in a volume that is now rare. In it are a number of letters written by other American farmers, including Thomas Jefferson, relative to agriculture in their localities. These letters were the result of inquiries made of Washington by Young in 1791. In order to obtain the facts desired Washington sent out a circular letter to some of the most intelligent farmers in the Middle States, and the replies form perhaps our best source of information regarding agricultural conditions in that period.

Because of this service and of his general interest in agricultural matters Washington was elected a foreign honorary member of the English Board of Agriculture and received a diploma, which is still preserved among his papers.

Some of Washington's other agricultural papers have been printed in one form and another, but a great number, and some the most interesting, can still be consulted only in manuscript.

Washington bequeathed his books and papers, along with his Mansion House, to his nephew, Bushrod Washington, an associate justice of the Federal Supreme Court. Judge Washington failed to appreciate fully the seriousness of the obligation thus incurred and instead of safeguarding the papers with the utmost jealousy gave many, including volumes of the diary, to visitors and friends who expressed a desire to possess mementoes of the illustrious patriot. In particular he permitted Reverend William Buel Sprague, who had been a tutor in the family of Nelly Custis Lewis, to take about fifteen hundred papers on condition that he leave copies in their places. The judge also intrusted a considerable portion to the historian Jared Sparks, who issued the first considerable edition of Washington's writings. Sparks likewise was guilty of giving away souvenirs.

Bushrod Washington died in 1829 and left the papers and letter books for the most part to his nephew John Corbin Washington. In 1834 the nation purchased of this gentleman the papers of a public character, paying twenty-five thousand dollars. The owner reserved the private papers, including invoices, ciphering book, rules of civility, etc., but in 1849 sold these also to the same purchaser for twenty thousand dollars. The papers were kept for many years in the Department of State, but in the administration of Theodore Roosevelt most of them were transferred to the Library of Congress, where they could be better cared for and would be more accessible.

Bushrod Washington gave to another nephew, John Augustine Washington, the books and relics in the dining-room of the Mansion House. In course of time these were scattered, some being bought for the Boston Athenaeum, which has decidedly the larger part of Washington's library; others were purchased by the state of New York, and yet others were exhibited at the Centennial Exposition and were later sold at auction. Among the relics bought by New York was a sword wrongly said to have been sent to the General by Frederick the Great.

One hundred and twenty-seven of his letters, mostly to William Pearce, his manager at Mount Vernon during a portion of his presidency, were bought from the heirs of Pearce by the celebrated Edward Everett and now belong to the Long Island Historical Society. These have been published. His correspondence with Tobias Lear, for many years his private secretary, are now in the collection of Thomas K. Bixby, a wealthy bibliophile of St. Louis. These also have been published. The one greatest repository of papers is the Library of Congress. Furthermore, through the unwearying activities of J. M. Toner, who devoted years to the work, the Library also has authenticated copies of many papers of which it does not possess the originals.

All told, according to Mr. Gaillard Hunt, who has them in charge, the Washington manuscripts in the Library of Congress is the largest collection of papers of one person in the world. The collection contains about eighteen thousand papers in his own hand, press copies, or drafts in the writing of his secretaries, and many times that number of others. As yet all except a small part are merely arranged in chronological order, but soon it is to be sumptuously bound in royal purple levant. The color, after all, is fitting, for he was a King and he reigns still in the hearts of his countrymen.

Benjamin Franklin knew the great men of earth of his time, the princes and kings of blood royal. Near the close of his life he wrote in his will: "My fine crabtree walking-stick with a gold head, curiously wrought in the form of a cap of Liberty, I give to my friend, and the friend of mankind, General Washington. If it was a sceptre, he has merited it, and would become it."

And thus Thackeray, who knew the true from the false, the dross from pure gold: "Which was the most splendid spectacle ever witnessed, the opening feast of Prince George in London or the resignation of Washington? Which is the noble character for ages to admire—yon fribble dancing in lace and spangles, or yonder hero who sheathes his sword after a life of spotless honor, a purity unreproached, a courage indomitable, and a consummate victory? Which of these is the true gentleman? What is it to be a gentleman? Is it to have lofty aims, to lead a pure life, to keep your honor virgin; to have the esteem of your fellow-citizens, and the love of your fireside; to bear good fortune meekly; to suffer evil with constancy; and through evil or good to maintain truth always? Show me the happy man whose life exhibits these qualities, and him will we salute as gentleman, whatever his rank may be; show me the prince who possesses them, and he may be sure of our love and loyalty."

'Tis often distance only that lends enchantment, but it is Washington's proud pre-eminence that he can bear the microscope. Having read thousands of his letters and papers dealing with almost every conceivable subject in the range of human affairs, I yet feel inclined, nay compelled, to bear witness to the greatness of his heart, soul and understanding. He was human. He had his faults. He made his mistakes. But I would not detract a line from any eulogium of him ever uttered. Words have never yet been penned that do him justice.



CHAPTER VII

AGRICULTURAL OPERATIONS AND EXPERIMENTS BEFORE THE REVOLUTION

A detailed account of all of Washington's agricultural experiments would require several hundred pages and would be tedious reading. All that I shall attempt to do is to give some examples and point the way for any enthusiast to the mass of his agricultural papers in the Library of Congress and elsewhere.

At the outset it should be stated that he worked under extremely different conditions from those of to-day. Any American farmer of the present who has a problem in his head can have it solved by writing to the nearest government experiment station, a good farm paper, an agricultural college, the department of agriculture, or in some favored districts by consulting the local county "agent." Washington had no such recourse. There was not an agricultural college or agricultural paper in the whole country; the department of agriculture was not created until near the end of the next century; county "agents" were as unthought of as automobiles or electric lights; there was not a scientific farmer in America; even the Philadelphia Society for the Promotion of Agriculture was not founded until 1785. In his later years our Farmer could and did write to such foreign specialists as Arthur Young and Sir John Sinclair, but they were Englishmen unfamiliar with American soils and climate and could rarely give a weighty answer propounded to them by an American. If Washington wished to know a thing about practical farming, he usually had to find it out for himself.

This state of affairs accounts for his performing some experiments that seem absurd. Thus in the fall of 1764 we find him sowing "a few Oats to see if they would stand the winter." Any country boy of to-day could tell him that ordinary oats sown under such conditions in the latitude of Mount Vernon would winter kill too badly to be of much use, but Washington could not know it till he had tried.

In another category was his experiment in March, 1760, with lucerne. Lucerne is alfalfa. It will probably be news to most readers that alfalfa—the wonderful forage crop of the West, the producer of more gold than all the mines of the Klondike—was in use so long ago, for the impression is pretty general that it is comparatively new; the fact is that it is older than the Christian era and that the name alfalfa comes from the Arabic and means "the best crop." Evidently our Farmer had been reading on the subject, for in his diary he quotes what "Tull speaking of lucerne, says." He tried out the plant on this and several other occasions and had a considerable field of it in 1798. His success was not large with it at any time, for the Mount Vernon soil was not naturally suited to alfalfa, which thrives best in a dry and pervious subsoil containing plenty of lime, but the experiment was certainly worth trying.

In this same year, 1760, we find him sowing clover, rye, grass, hope, trefoil, timothy, spelt, which was a species of wheat, and various other grasses and vegetables, most of them to all intents and purposes unknown to the Virginia agriculture of that day.

He also recorded an interesting experiment with fertilizer. April 14, 1760, he writes in his diary:

"Mixed my composts in a box with the apartments in the following manner, viz. No. 1 is three pecks of earth brought from below the hill out of the 46 acre field without any mixture. In No. 2 is two pecks of sand earth and one of marle taken out of the said field, which marle seemed a little inclined to sand. 3 has 2 pecks of sd. earth and 1 of river sand.

"4 has a peck of Horse Dung

"5 has mud taken out of the creek

"6 has cow dung

"7 has marle from the Gulleys on the hillside, wch. seem'd to be purer than the other

"8 sheep dung

"9 Black mould from the Gulleys on the hill side, wch. seem'd to be purer than the other

"10 Clay got just below the garden

"All mixed with the same quantity and sort of earth in the most effective manner by reducing the whole to a tolerable degree of fineness and rubbing them well together on a cloth. In each of these divisions were planted three grains of wheat, 3 of oats, and as many of barley, all of equal distances in Rows and of equal depth done by a machine made for the purpose. The wheat rows are next the numbered side, the oats in the middle, and the barley on the side next the upper part of the Garden. Two or three hours after sowing in this manner, and about an hour before sunset I watered them all equally alike with water that had been standing in a tub abt two hours exposed to the sun."

Three weeks later he inspected the boxes and concluded that Nos. 8 and 9 gave the best results.

The plows of the period were cumbersome and did their work poorly. Consequently in March, 1760, Washington "Fitted a two Eyed Plow instead of a Duck Bill Plow", and tried it out, using his carriage horses in the work. But this new model proved upon the whole a failure and a little later he "Spent the greater part of the day in making a new plow of my own Invention." Next day he set the new plow to work "and found She answerd very well."

A little later he "got a new harrow made of smaller and closer teethings for harrowing in grain—the other being more proper for preparing the ground for sowing."

Much of his attention in the next few years was devoted to wheat growing, for, as already related, he soon decided gradually to discontinue tobacco and it was imperative for him to discover some other money crop to take its place. We find him steeping his seed wheat in brine and alum to prevent smut and he also tried other experiments to protect his grain from the Hessian fly and rust. Noticing how the freezing and thawing of the ground in spring often injured the wheat by lifting it out of the ground, he adopted the practice of running a heavy roller over the wheat in order to get the roots back into the ground and he was confident that when the operation was performed at the proper time, that is when the ground was soft and the roots were still alive, it was productive of good results.

In June, 1763, he "dug up abt. a load of Marle to spread over Wheat Land for experiment." In 1768 he came to the conclusion that most farmers began to cut their wheat too late, for of course cradling was a slow process—scarcely four acres per day per cradler—and if the acreage was large several days must elapse before the last of the grain could be cut, with the result that some of it became so ripe that many of the kernels were shattered out and lost before the straw could be got to the threshing floor. By careful experiments he determined that the grain would not lose perceptibly in size and weight if the wheat were cut comparatively green. In wheat-growing communities the discussion as to this question still rages—extremists on one side will not cut their wheat till it is dead ripe, while those on the other begin to harvest it when it is almost sea-green.

In 1763 Washington entered into an agreement with John Carlyle and Robert Adams of Alexandria to sell to them all the wheat he would have to dispose of in the next seven years. The price was to be three shillings and nine pence per bushel, that is, about ninety-one cents. This would not be far from the average price of wheat to-day, but, on the one side, we should bear in mind that ninety-one cents then had much greater purchasing power than now, so that the price was really much greater, and, on the other, that the cost of raising wheat was larger then, owing to lack of self-binders, threshing machines and other labor-saving devices.

The wheat thus sold by Washington was to be delivered at the wharf at Alexandria or beside a boat or flat on Four Mile Run Creek. The delivery for 1764 was 257-1/2 bushels; for 1765, 1,112-3/4 bushels; for 1766, 2,331-1/2 bushels; for 1767—a bad year—1,293-1/2 bushels; for 1768, 4,994-1/2 bushels of wheat and 4,304-1/2 bushels of corn; for 1769, 6,241-1/2 bushels of wheat.

Thereafter he ground a good part of his wheat and sold the flour. He owned three mills, one in western Pennsylvania, already referred to, a second on Four Mile Run near Alexandria, and a third on the Mount Vernon estate. This last mill had been in operation since his father's day. It was situated near the mouth of the stream known as Dogue Run, which was not very well suited for the purpose as it ran from the extreme of low water in summer to violent floods in winter and spring. Thus his miller, William A. Poole, in a letter that wins the sweepstakes in phonetic spelling, complains in 1757 that he has been able to grind but little because "She fails by want of Water." At other times the Master sallies out in the rain with rescue crews to save the mill from floods and more than once the "tumbling dam" goes by the board in spite of all efforts. The lack of water was partly remedied in 1771 by turning the water of Piney Branch into the Run, and about the same time a new and better mill was erected, while in 1797 further improvements were made. During the whole period flatboats and small schooners could come to the wharf to take away the flour. Corn and other grains were ground, as well as wheat, and the mill had considerable neighborhood custom, the toll exacted being one-eighth. Only a few stones sticking in a bank now remain of the mill.

Washington divided his flour into superfine, fine, middlings and ship stuff. It was put into barrels manufactured by the plantation coopers and much of it ultimately found its way to the West India market. A tradition—much quoted—has it that barrels marked "George Washington, Mount Vernon," were accepted in the islands without any inspection, but Mr. J.M. Toner, one of the closest students of Washington's career, contended that this was a mistake and pointed to the fact that the Virginia law provided for the inspection of all flour before it was exported and the placing of a brand on each barrel. However this may be, we have Washington's own word for it, that his flour was as good in quality as any manufactured in America—and he was no boaster.



That his flour was so good was in large measure due to the excellent quality of the wheat from which it was made. By careful attention to his seed and to cultivation he succeeded in raising grain that often weighed upward of sixty pounds to the bushel. After the Revolution he wrote: "No wheat that has ever yet fallen under my observation exceeds the wheat which some years ago I cultivated extensively."

His idea of good cultivation in these years was to let his fields lie fallow at certain intervals, though he also made use of manure, marl, etc., and in 1772 tried the experiment of sowing two bushels of salt per acre upon fallow ground, dividing the plot up into strips eight feet in width and sowing the alternate strips in order that he might be able to determine results.

He imported from England an improved Rotheran or patent plow, and, having noticed in an agricultural work mention of a machine capable of pulling up two or three hundred stumps per day, he expressed a desire for one, saying: "If the accounts are not greatly exaggerated, such powerful assistance must be of vast utility in many parts of this wooden country, where it is impossible for our force (and laborers are not to be hired here), between the finishing of one crop and preparations for another, to clear ground fast enough to afford the proper changes, either in the planting or farming business."

These were his golden days. He was not so rich as he was later nor so famous, but he was strong and well and young, he had abundant friends, and his neighbors thought well enough of him to send him to the Burgesses and to make him a vestryman of old Pohick Church; if he felt the need of recreation he went fishing or fox-hunting or attended a horse race or played a game of cards with his friends, and he had few things to trouble him seriously. But fussy kings and ministers overseas were meddling with the liberties of subjects and were creating a situation out of which was to come a mighty burden—a burden so Atalantean that it would have frightened most men, but one that he was brave enough and strong enough to shoulder and with it march down to immortality.



CHAPTER VIII

CONSERVING THE SOIL

The Revolution rudely interrupted Washington's farming experiments, and for eight long years he was so actively engaged in the grim business of checkmating Howe and Clinton and Cornwallis that he could give little time or thought to agriculture. For more than six years, in fact, he did not once set foot upon his beloved fields and heard of his crops, his servants and his live stock only from family visitors to his camps or through the pages of his manager's letters.

Peace at last brought him release. He had left Mount Vernon a simple country gentleman; he came back to it one of the most famous men in the world. He wasted no time in contemplating his laurels, but at once threw himself with renewed enthusiasm into his old occupation. His observation of northern agriculture and conversations with other farmers had broadened his views and he was more than ever progressive. He was now thoroughly convinced of the great desirability of grass and stock for conserving the soil and he was also wide awake to the need of better tools and methods and wished to make his estate beautiful as well as useful.

Much of his energy in 1784-85 was devoted to rebuilding his house and improving his grounds, and to his trip to his Ohio lands—all of which are described elsewhere. No diary exists for 1784 except that of the trip to the Ohio, but from the diary of 1785 we learn that he found time to experiment with plaster of Paris and powdered stone as fertilizers, to sow clover, orchard grass, guinea grass and peas and to borrow a scow with which to raise rich mud from the bed of the Potomac.

The growing poverty of his soil, in fact, was a subject to which he gave much attention. He made use of manure when possible, but the supply of this was limited and commercial fertilizers were unknown. As already indicated, he was beginning the use of clover and other grasses, but he was anxious to build up the soil more rapidly and the Potomac muck seemed to him a possible answer to the problem. There was, as he said, "an inexhaustible fund" of it, but the task of getting it on the land was a heavy one. Having heard of a horse-power dredge called the Hippopotamus that was in use on the Delaware River, he made inquiries concerning it but feared that it would not serve his purpose, as he would have to go from one hundred to eight hundred or a thousand yards from high water-mark for the mud—too far out for a horse to be available. Mechanical difficulties and the cost of getting up the mud proved too great for him—as they have proved too great even down to the present—but he never gave up the idea and from time to time tried experiments with small plots of ground that had been covered with the mud. His enthusiasm on the subject was so great that Noah Webster, of dictionary fame, who visited him in this period, says that the standing toast at Mount Vernon was "Success to the mud!"

Every scientific agriculturist knows that erosion is one of the chief causes of loss in soil fertility and that in the basins and deltas of streams and rivers there is going to waste enough muck to make all of our land rich. But the cost of getting this fertility back to the soil has thus far proved too great for us to undertake the task of restoration. It is conceivable, however, that the time may come when we shall undertake the work in earnest and then the dream of Washington will be realized.

The spring and summer of 1785 proved excessively dry, and the crops suffered, as they always do in times of drought. The wheat yield was poor and chinch bugs attacked the corn in such myriads that our Farmer found "hundreds of them & their young under the blades and at the lower joints of the Stock." By the middle of August "Nature had put on a melancholy look." The corn was "fired in most places to the Ear, with little appearance of yielding if Rain should now come & a certainty of making nothing if it did not."

Like millions of anxious farmers before and after him, he watched eagerly for the rain that came not. He records in his diary that on August 17th a good deal of rain fell far up the river, but as for his fields—it tantalizingly passed by on the other side, and "not enough fell here to wet a handkerchief." On the eighteenth, nineteenth and twenty-second clouds and thunder and lightning again awakened hopes but only slight sprinkles resulted. On the twenty-seventh nature at last relented and, to his great satisfaction, there was a generous downpour.

The rain was beneficial to about a thousand grains of Cape of Good Hope wheat that Washington had just sown and by the thirty-first he was able to note that it was coming up. For several years thereafter he experimented with this wheat. He found that it grew up very rank and tried cutting some of it back. But the variety was not well adapted to Virginia and ultimately he gave it up.

In this period he also tried Siberian wheat, put marl on sixteen square rods of meadow[4], plowed under rye, and experimented with oats, carrots, Eastern Shore peas, supposed to be strengthening to land, also rib grass, burnet and various other things. He planted potatoes both with and without manure and noted carefully the difference in yields. At this time he favored planting corn in rows about ten feet apart, with rows of potatoes, carrots, or peas between. He noted down that his experience showed that corn ought to be planted not later than May 15th, preferably by the tenth or perhaps even as early as the first, in which his practice would not differ much from that of to-day. But he came to an erroneous conclusion when he decided that wheat ought to be sown in August or at the latter end of July, for this was playing into the hands of his enemy, the Hessian fly, which is particularly destructive to early sown wheat. Later he seems to have changed his mind on that point, for near the end of his life he instructed his manager to get the wheat in by September 10th. Another custom which he was advocating was that of fall and winter plowing and he had as much of it done as time and weather would permit. All of his experiments in this period were painstakingly set down and he even took the trouble in 1786 to index his agricultural notes and observations for that year.

[4] "On sixteen square rod of ground in my lower pasture, I put 140 Bushels of what we call Marle viz on 4 of these, No. Wt. corner were placed 50 bushels—on 4 others So. Wt. corner 30 bushels—on 4 others So. Et. corner 40 bushels—and on the remaining 4-20 bushels. This Marle was spread on the rods in these proportions—to try first whether what we have denominated to be Marie possesses any virtue as manure—and secondly—if it does, the quantity proper for an acre." His ultimate conclusion was that marl was of little benefit to land such as he owned at Mount Vernon.

Many of his experiments were made in what he called his "Botanical Garden," a plot of ground lying between the flower garden and the spinner's house. But he had experimental plots on most or all of his plantations, and each day as he made the rounds of his estate on horseback he would examine how his plants were growing or would start new experiments.

The record of failures is, of course, much greater than of successes, but that is the experience of every scientific farmer or horticulturist who ventures out of the beaten path. Even Burbank, the wizard, has his failures—and many of them.

One of Washington's successes was what he called a "barrel plough." At that time all seed, such as corn, wheat and oats had to be sown or dropped by hand and then covered with a harrow or a hoe or something of the kind. Washington tried to make a machine that would do the work more expeditiously and succeeded, though it should be said that his plans were not altogether original with him, as there was a plan for such a machine in Duhamel and another was published by Arthur Young about this time in the Annals of Agriculture, which Washington was now perusing with much attention. Richard Peters also sent yet another plan.

Washington's drill, as we should call it to-day, consisted of a barrel or hollow cylinder of wood mounted upon a wheeled plow and so arranged that as the plow moved forward the barrel turned. In the barrel, holes were cut or burnt through which the corn or other seed could drop into tubes that ran down to the ground. By decreasing or increasing the number of holes the grain could be planted thicker or thinner as desired. To prevent the holes from choking up he found it expedient to make them larger on the outside than on the inside, and he also found that the machine worked better if the barrel was not kept too full of seed. Behind the drills ran a light harrow or drag which covered the seed, though in rough ground it was necessary to have a man follow after with a hoe to assist the process. A string was fastened to this harrow by which it could be lifted around when turning at the ends of the rows, the drill itself being managed by a pair of handles.

Washington wrote to a friend that the drill would not "work to good effect in land that is very full either of stumps, stones, or large clods; but, where the ground is tolerably free from these and in good tilth, and particularly in light land, I am certain you will find it equal to your most sanguine expectation, for Indian corn, wheat, barley, pease, or any other tolerably round grain, that you may wish to sow or plant in this manner. I have sown oats very well with it, which is among the most inconvenient and unfit grains for this machine.... A small bag, containing about a peck of the seed you are sowing, is hung to the nails on the right handle, and with a small tin cup the barrel is replenished with convenience, whenever it is necessary, without loss of time, or waiting to come up with the seed-bag at the end of the row."

As Washington says, the drill would probably work well under ideal conditions, but there were features of it that would incline, I have no doubt, to make its operator swear at times. There was a leather band that ran about the barrel with holes corresponding to those in the barrel, the purpose of the band being to prevent the seeds issuing out of more than one hole at the same time. This band had to be "slackened or braced" according to the influence of the atmosphere upon the leather, and sometimes the holes in the band tended to gape and admit seed between the band and the barrel, in which case Washington found it expedient to rivet "a piece of sheet tin, copper, or brass, the width of the band, and about four inches long, with a hole through it, the size of the one in the leather."

Washington was, however, very proud of the drill, and it must have worked fairly well, for he was not the man to continue to use a worthless implement simply because he had made it. He even used it to sow very small seed. In the summer of 1786 he records: "Having fixed a Roller to the tale of my drill plow, & a brush between it and the barrel, I sent it to Muddy Hole & sowed turnips in the intervals of corn[5]."

[5] Another passage from his papers in which he mentions using his drill plow is also illustrative of the emphasis he placed upon having the seed bed for a crop properly prepared. The passage describes his sowing some spring wheat and is as follows: "12th [of April, 1785].—Sowed sixteen acres of Siberian wheat, with eighteen quarts, in rows between corn, eight feet apart. This ground had been prepared in the following manner: 1. A single furrow; 2. another in the same to deepen it; 3. four furrows to throw the earth back into the two first, which made ridges of five furrows. These, being done some time ago, and the sowing retarded by frequent rains, had got hard; therefore, 4. before the seed was sown, these ridges were split again by running twice in the middle of them, both times in the same furrow; 5. after which the ridges were harrowed; and, 6. where the ground was lumpy, run a spiked roller with a harrow at the tail of it, which was found very efficacious in breaking the clods and pulverizing the earth, and would have done it perfectly, if there had not been too much moisture remaining from the late rains. After this, harrowing and rolling were necessary, the wheat was sown with the drill plough on the reduced ridges eight feet apart, as above mentioned, and harrowed in with the small harrow belonging to the plough. But it should have been observed, that, after the ridges were split by the middle double furrows, and before they were closed again by the harrow, a little manure was sprinkled in."

No man better understood the value of good clean seed than did he, but he had much trouble in satisfying his desires in this respect. Often the seed he bought was foul with weed seeds, and at other times it would not grow at all. Once he mentions having set the women and "weak hands" to work picking wild onions out of some Eastern Shore oats that he had bought.

He advocated planting the largest and finest potatoes instead of the little ones, as some farmers out of false ideas of economy still make the mistake of doing, and he followed the same principle that "the best will produce the best" in selecting all seed.

He also appreciated the importance of getting just the right stand of grain—not too many plants and not too few—upon his fields and conducted investigations along this line. He laboriously calculated the number of seed in a pound Troy of various seeds and ascertained, for example, that the number of red clover was 71,000, of timothy 298,000, of "New River Grass" 844,800 and of barley 8,925. Knowing these facts, he was able to calculate how much ought to be sowed of a given seed to the acre.

The spectacle of the former Commander of the Armies of a Continent engaging in such minute labor is ridiculous or sublime, according to the viewpoint!

In the spring of the year that he helped to frame the Federal Constitution he "Sowed the squares No. 2 & 4 at this place [Dogue Run] with oats in the following manner—viz—the East half of No. 2 with half a Bushel of Oats from George Town—and the west half with a Bushel of Poland Oats—The east half of No. 4 with half a bushel of the Poland Oats and the west half with a bushel of the George Town Oats. The objects, and design of this experiment, was to ascertn. 3 things—1st. which of these two kinds of Oats were best the George Town (which was a good kind of the common Oats)—2d. whether two or four bushels to the Acre was best—and 3d. the difference between ground dunged at the Rate of 5 load or 200 bushels to the Acre and ground undunged."

This experiment is typical of a great many others and it resulted, of course, in better yields on the manured ground and showed that two bushels of seed were preferable to four. But if he ever set down the result of the experiment as regards the varieties, the passage has escaped me.

While at Fredericksburg this year visiting his mother and his sister Betty Lewis he learned of an interesting method of raising potatoes under straw and wrote down the details in his diary. A little later when attending the Federal Convention he kept his eyes and ears open for agricultural information. He learned how the Pennsylvanians cultivated buckwheat and visited the farm of a certain Jones, who was getting good results from the use of plaster of Paris. With his usual interest in labor-saving machinery he inspected at Benjamin Franklin's a sort of ironing machine called a mangle, "well calculated," he thought, "for Table cloths & such articles as have not pleats & irregular foldings & would be very useful in large families."

This year he had in wheat seven hundred acres, in grass five hundred eighty acres, in oats four hundred acres, in corn seven hundred acres, with several hundred more in buckwheat, barley, potatoes, peas, beans and turnips.

In 1788 he raised one thousand eighty-eight bushels of potatoes on one plantation, but they were not dug till December and in consequence some were badly injured by the frost. An experiment that year was one of transplanting carrots between rows of corn and it was not successful.

He worked hard in these years, but, as many another industrious farmer has discovered, he found that he could do little unless nature smiled and fickle nature persisted in frowning. In 1785 the rain seemed to forget how to fall, and in 1786 how to stop falling. Some crops failed or were very short and soon he was so hard up that he was anxious to sell some lands or negroes to meet debts coming due. In February, 1786, in sending fifteen guineas to his mother, he wrote:

"I have now demands upon me for more than L500, three hundred and forty odd of which is due for the tax of 1786; and I know not where or when I shall receive one shilling with which to pay it. In the last two years I made no crops. In the first I was obliged to buy corn, and this year have none to sell, and my wheat is so bad I can neither eat it myself nor sell it to others, and tobacco I make none. Those who owe me money cannot or will not pay it without suits, and to sue is to do nothing; whilst my expenses, not from any extravagance, or an inclination on my part to live splendidly, but for the absolute support of my family and the visitors who are constantly here, are exceedingly high."

To bad crops were joined bad conditions throughout the country generally. The government of the Confederation was dying of inanition, America was flooded with depreciated currency, both state and Continental. In western Massachusetts a rebellion broke out, the rebels being largely discouraged debtors. A state of chaos seemed imminent and would have resulted had not the Federal Convention, of which Washington was a member, created a new government. Ultimately this government brought order and financial stability, but all this took time and Washington was so financially embarrassed in 1789 when he traveled to New York to be inaugurated President that he had to borrow money to pay the expenses of the journey.

After having set the wheels of government in motion he made an extended trip through New England and whenever public festivities would permit he examined into New England farm methods and took copious notes. On the first day up from New York he saw good crops of corn mixed with pumpkins and met four droves of beef cattle, "some of which were very fine—also a Flock of Sheep.... We scarcely passed a farm house that did not abd. in Geese." His judgment of New England stock was that the cattle were "of a good quality and their hogs large, but rather long legged." The shingle roofs, stone and brick chimneys, stone fences and cider making all attracted his attention. The fact that wheat in that section produced an average of fifteen bushels per acre and often twenty or twenty-five was duly noted. On the whole he seems to have considered the tour enjoyable and profitable in spite of the fact that on his return through Connecticut the law against Sabbath traveling compelled him to remain over Sunday at Perkins' Tavern and to attend church twice, where he "heard very lame discourses from a Mr. Pond."

About 1785 Washington had begun a correspondence with Arthur Young and also began to read his periodical called the Annals of Agriculture. The Annals convinced him more than ever of the superiority of the English system of husbandry and not only gave him the idea for some of the experiments that have been mentioned, but also made him very desirous of adopting a regular and systematic course of cropping in order to conserve his soil. Taking advantage of an offer made by Young, he ordered (August 6, 1786) through him English plows, cabbage, turnip, sainfoin, rye-grass and hop clover seed and eight bushels of winter vetches; also some months later, velvet wheat, field beans, spring barley, oats and more sainfoin seed. He furthermore expressed a wish for "a plan of the most complete and useful farmyard, for farms of about 500 acres. In this I mean to comprehend the barn, and every appurtenance which ought to be annexed to the yard."

Young was as good as his word. Although English law forbade the exportation of some of these things—a fact of which Washington was not aware—he and Sir John Sinclair prevailed upon Lord Grenville to issue a special permit and in due course everything reached Mount Vernon. Part of the seeds were somewhat injured by being put into the hold of the vessel that brought them over, with the result that they overheated—a thing that troubled Washington whenever he imported seeds—but on the whole the consignment was in fair order, and our Farmer was duly grateful.

The plows appeared excessively heavy to the Virginians who looked them over, but a trial showed that they worked "exceedingly well."

To Young's plan for a barn and barnyard Washington made some additions and constructed the barn upon Union Farm, building it of bricks that were made on the estate. He later expressed a belief that it was "the largest and most convenient one in this country." It has now disappeared almost utterly, but Young's plan was subsequently engraved in the Annals.

In return for the exertions of Young and Sinclair in his behalf Washington sent over some American products and also took pains to collect information for them as to the state of American agriculture. His letters show an almost pathetic eagerness to please these good friends and it is evident that in his farming operations he regarded himself as one of Young's disciples. He was no egotist who believed that because he had been a successful soldier and was now President of the United States he could not learn anything from a specialist. The trait was most commendable and one that is sadly lacking in many of his countrymen, some of whom take pride in declaring that "these here scientific fellers caint tell me nothin' about raisin' corn!"

Young and Sir John Sinclair were by no means his only agricultural correspondents. Even Noah Webster dropped his legal and philological work long enough in 1790 to propound a theory so startlingly modern in its viewpoint that it is worthy of reproduction. Said he:

"While therefore I allow, in its full extent, the value of stable manure, marl, plaster of Paris, lime, ashes, sea-weed, sea-shells & salt, in enriching land, I believe none of them are absolutely necessary, but that nature has provided an inexhaustible store of manure, which is equally accessible to the rich and the poor, & which may be collected & applied to land with very little labor and expense. This store is the atmosphere, & the process by which the fertilizing substance may be obtained is vegetation."

He added that such crops as oats, peas, beans and buckwheat should be raised and plowed under to rot and that land should never be left bare. As one peruses the letter he recalls that scientists of to-day tell us that the air is largely made up of nitrogen, that plants are able to "fix it," and he half expects to find Webster advocating "soil innoculation" and speaking of "nodules" and "bacteria."

Throughout the period after the Revolution our Farmer's one greatest concern was to conserve and restore his land. When looking for a new manager he once wrote that the man must be, "above all, Midas like, one who can convert everything he touches into manure, as the first transmutation toward gold; in a word, one who can bring worn-out and gullied lands into good tilth in the shortest time." He saved manure as if it were already so much gold and hoped with its use and with judicious rotation of crops to accomplish his object. "Unless some such practice as this prevails," he wrote in 1794, "my fields will be growing worse and worse every year, until the Crops will not defray the expense of the culture of them."

He drew up elaborate plans for the rotation of crops on his different farms. Not content with one plan, he often drew up several alternatives; calculated the probable financial returns from each, allowing for the cost of seed, cultivation and other expenses, and commented upon the respective advantages from every point of view of the various plans. The labor involved in such work was very great, but Washington was no shirker. He was always up before sunrise, both in winter and summer, and seems to have been so constituted that he was most contented when he had something to do. Perhaps if he had had to engage in hard manual toil every day he would have had less inclination for such employment, but he worked with his own hands only intermittently, devoting his time mostly to planning and oversight.

One such plan for Dogue Run Farm is given on the next page. To understand it the reader should bear in mind that the farm contained five hundred twenty-five arable acres divided into seven fields, each of which contained about seventy-five acres.

No. of Fields 1793 1794 1795 1796 1797 1798 1799 Corn Buckwheat Clover Clover Clover 3 and Wheat for Wheat or or or Potatoes Manure Grass Grass Grass Clover Corn Buckwheat Clover Clover 4 or and Wheat for Wheat or or Grass Potatoes Manure Grass Grass Clover Clover Corn Buckwheat Clover 5 or or and Wheat for Wheat or Grass Grass Potatoes Manure Grass Clover Clover Clover Corn Buckwheat 6 or or or and Wheat for Wheat Grass Grass Grass Potatoes Manure Clover Clover Clover Corn Buckwheat 7 Wheat or or or and Wheat for Grass Grass Grass Potatoes Manure Buckwheat Clover Clover Clover Corn 1 for Wheat or or or and Wheat Manure Grass Grass Grass Potatoes Buckwheat Clover Clover Clover Cornr 2 Wheat for Wheat or or or and Manure Grass Grass Grass Potatoes

Of this rotation he noted that it "favors the land very much; inasmuch as there are but three corn crops [i.e. grain crops] taken in seven years from any field, & the first of the wheat crops is followed by a Buck Wheat manure for the second Wheat Crop, wch. is to succeed it; & which by being laid to Clover or Grass & continued therein three years will a ford much Mowing or Grassing, according as the Seasons happen to be, besides being a restoration to the Soil—But the produce of the sale of the Crops is small, unless encreased by the improving state of the fields. Nor will the Grain for the use of the Farm be adequate to the consumption of it in this Course, and this is an essential object to attend to."

In a second table he estimated the amount of work that would be required each year to carry out this plan of rotation, assuming that one plow would break up three-fourths of an acre per day. This amount is hardly half what an energetic farmer with a good team of horses will now turn over in a day with an ordinary walking plow, but the negro farmer lacked ambition, the plows were cumbersome, and much of the work was done with plodding oxen. The table follows:



He estimated that seventy-five acres of corn would yield, at twelve and a half bushels per acre, 937-1/2 bushels, worth at two shillings and sixpence per bushel L117.3.9. In this field potatoes would be planted between the rows of corn and would produce, at twelve and a half bushels per acre, 937-1/2 bushels, worth at one shilling per bushel L46.17.6. Two fields in wheat, a total of one hundred fifty acres, at ten bushels per acre, would yield one thousand five hundred bushels, worth at five shillings per bushel three hundred seventy-five pounds. Three fields in clover and grass and the field of buckwheat to be turned under for manure would yield no money return. In other words the whole farm would produce three thousand three hundred seventy-five bushels of grain and potatoes worth a total of L539.1.3.

A second alternative plan would yield crops worth L614.1.3; a third, about the same; a fourth, L689.1.3; a fifth, providing for two hundred twenty-five acres of wheat, L801.11.0; a sixth, L764. Number five would be most productive, but he noted that it would seriously reduce the land. Number six would be "the 2d. most productive Rotation, but the fields receive no rest," as it provided for neither grass nor pasture, while the plowing required would exceed that of any of the other plans by two hundred eighty days.

On a small scale he tried growing cotton, Botany Bay grass, hemp, white nankeen grass and various other products. He experimented with deep soil plowing by running twice in the same furrow and also cultivated some wheat that had been drilled in rows instead of broadcasted.

In 1793 he built a new sixteen-sided barn on the



Dogue Run Farm. The plan of this barn, drawn by Washington himself, is still preserved and is reproduced herewith. He calculated that one hundred and forty thousand bricks would be required for it and these were made and burnt upon the estate. The barn was particularly notable for a threshing floor thirty feet square, with interstices one and a half inches wide left between the floor boards so that the grain when trodden out by horses or beat out with flails would fall through to the floor below, leaving the straw above.

This floor was to furnish an illustration of what Washington called "the almost impossibility of putting the overseers of this country out of the track they have been accustomed to walk in. I have one of the most convenient barns in this or perhaps any other country, where thirty hands may with great ease be employed in threshing. Half the wheat of the farm was actually stowed in this barn in the straw by my order, for threshing; notwithstanding, when I came home about the middle of September, I found a treading yard not thirty feet from the barn-door, the wheat again brought out of the barn, and horses treading it out in an open exposure, liable to the vicissitudes of the weather."

I think we may safely conclude that this was one of those rare occasions when George lost his temper and "went up in the air!"

Under any conditions treading or flailing out wheat was a slow and unsatisfactory process and, as Washington grew great quantities of this grain, he was alert for a better method. We know that he made inquiries of Arthur Young concerning a threshing machine invented by a certain Winlaw and pictured and described in volume six of the Annals, and in 1790 he watched the operation of Baron Poelnitz's mill on the Winlaw model near New York City. This mill was operated by two men and was capable of threshing about two bushels of wheat per hour—pretty slow work as compared with that of a modern thresher. And the grain had to be winnowed, or passed through a fan afterward to separate it from the chaff.

Finally in 1797 he erected a machine on plans evolved by William Booker, who came to Mount Vernon and oversaw the construction. Next April he wrote to Booker that the machine "has by no means answered your expectations or mine," At first it threshed not quite fifty bushels per day, then fell to less than twenty-five, and ultimately got out of order before five hundred bushels had been threshed, though it had used up two bands costing between eight and ten pounds. Booker replied that he had now greatly improved his invention and would come to Mount Vernon and make these additions, but whether or not he ever did so I have failed to discover.

By 1793 the burden of the estate had become so heavy that Washington decided to rent all of it except the Mansion House Farm and accordingly he wrote to Arthur Young telling his desire in the hope that Englishmen might be found to take it over. One man, Parkinson, of whom more hereafter, came to America and looked at one of the farms, but decided not to rent it. Washington's elaborate description of his land in his letter to Young, with an accompanying map, forms one of our best sources of information regarding Mount Vernon, so that we may be grateful that he had the intention even though nothing came of it. The whole of Mount Vernon continued to be cultivated as before until the last year of his life when he rented Dogue Run Farm to his nephew, Lawrence Lewis.

As a public man he was anxious to improve the general state of American agriculture and in his last annual message to Congress recommended the establishment of a board of agriculture to collect and diffuse information and "by premiums and small pecuniary aids to encourage and assist a spirit of discovery and improvement." In this recommendation the example of the English Board of Agriculture and the influence of his friend Arthur Young are discernible. It would have been well for the country if Congress had heeded the advice, but public opinion was not then educated to the need of such a step and almost a century passed before anything of much importance was done by the national government to improve the state of American agriculture.

In farming as in politics Washington was no standpatter. Notwithstanding many discouragements, he could not be kept from trying new things, and he furnished his farms with every kind of improved tool and implement calculated to do better work. At his death he owned not only threshing machines and a Dutch fan, but a wheat drill, a corn drill, a machine for gathering clover seed and another for raking up wheat. Yet most of his countrymen remained content to drop corn by hand, to broadcast their wheat, to tread out their grain and otherwise to follow methods as old as the days of Abel for at least another half century.

He was the first American conservationist. He realized that man owes a duty to the future just as he owes a debt to the past. He deplored the already developing policy of robber exploitation by which our soil and forests have been despoiled, for he foresaw the bitter fruits which such a policy must produce, and indeed was already producing on the fields of Virginia. He was no misanthropic cynic to exclaim, "What has posterity ever done for us that we should concern ourselves for posterity?" His care for the lands of Mount Vernon was evidence of the God-given trait imbedded in the best of men to transmit unimpaired to future generations what has been handed down to them.

His agricultural career has its lessons for us, even though we should not do well to follow some of his methods. The lessons lie rather in his conception of farming as an honorable occupation capable of being put on a better and more scientific basis by the application of brains and intelligence; in his open-minded and progressive seeking after better ways. Many of his experiments failed, it is true, but for his time he was a great Farmer, just as he was a great Patriot, Soldier and Statesman. Patient, hard-working, methodical, willing to sacrifice his own interests to those of the general good, he was one of those men who have helped raise mankind from the level of the brute and his whole career reflects credit upon human nature.

Peace hath its victories no less renowned than war, and the picture of the American Cincinnatus striving as earnestly on the green fields of Mount Vernon as he did upon the scarlet ones of Monmouth and Brandywine, is one that the world can not afford to forget.



CHAPTER IX

THE STOCKMAN

A various times in his career Washington raised deer, turkeys, hogs, cattle, geese, negroes and various other forms of live stock, but his greatest interest seems to have been reserved for horses, sheep and mules.

From his diaries and other papers that have come down to us it is easy to see that during his early married life he paid most attention to his horses. In 1760 he kept a stallion both for his own mares and for those of his neighbors, and we find many entries concerning the animal. Successors were "Leonidas," "Samson," "Steady," "Traveller" and "Magnolia," the last a full-blooded Arabian and probably the finest beast he ever owned. When away from home Washington now and then directed the manager to advertise the animal then reigning or to exhibit him in public places such as fairs. Mares brought to the stallion were kept upon pasture, and foal was guaranteed. Many times the General complained of the difficulty of collecting fees.

During the Revolution he bought twenty-seven worn-out army mares for breeding purposes and soon after he became President he purchased at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, thirteen fine animals for the same use. These last cost him a total of L317.17.6, the price of the highest being L25.7.6 and of the cheapest L22.10. These mares were unusually good animals, as an ordinary beast would have cost only five or six pounds.

In November, 1785, he had on his various Mount Vernon farms a total of one hundred thirty horses, including the Arabian already mentioned. Among the twenty-one animals kept at the Mansion House were his old war horses "Nelson" and "Blewskin," who after bearing their master through the smoke and dangers of many battles lived in peace to a ripe old age on the green fields of Virginia.

In his last days he bought two of the easy-gaited animals known as Narragansetts, a breed, some readers will recall, described at some length by Cooper in The Last of the Mohicans. A peculiarity of these beasts was that they moved both legs on a side forward at the same time, that is, they were pacers. Washington's two proved somewhat skittish, and one of them was responsible for the only fall from horseback that we have any record of his receiving. In company with Major Lewis, Mr. Peake, young George Washington Custis and a groom he was returning in the evening from Alexandria and dismounted for a few moments near a fire on the roadside. When he attempted to mount again the horse sprang forward suddenly and threw him. The others jumped from their horses to assist him, but the old man got up quickly, brushed his clothes and explained that he had been thrown only because he had not yet got seated. All the horses meanwhile had run away and the party started to walk four miles home, but luckily some negroes along the road caught the fugitives and brought them back. Washington insisted upon mounting his animal again and rode home without further incident. This episode happened only a few weeks before his death.

Like every farmer he found that his horses had a way of growing old. Those with which he had personal associations, like "Blueskin" and "Nelson," he kept until they died of old age. With others he sometimes followed a different course. In 1792 we find his manager, Whiting, writing: "We have several Old Horses that are not worth keeping thro winter. One at Ferry has not done one days work these 18 Months. 2 at Muddy hole one a horse with the Pole evil which I think will not get well the other an Old Mare was not capable of work last summer. Likewise the Horse called old Chatham and the Lame Horse that used to go in the Waggon now in a one horse Cart. If any thing could be Got for them it might be well but they are not worth keeping after Christmas." No doubt a sentimental person would say that Washington ought to have kept these old servants, but he had many other superannuated servants of the human kind upon his hands, so he replied that Whiting might dispose of the old horses "as you judge best for my interest."

Now and then his horses met with accidents. Thus on February 22, 1760, his horse "Jolly" got his right foreleg "mashed to pieces," probably by a falling limb. "Did it up as well as I could this night." "Saturday, Feb. 23d. Had the Horse Slung upon Canvas and his leg fresh set, following Markleham's directions as well as I could." Two days later the horse fell out of the sling and hurt himself so badly that he had to be killed.

Of Washington's skill as a trainer of horses his friend De Chastellux writes thus: "The weather being fair, on the 26th, I got on horseback, after breakfasting with the general—he was so attentive as to give me the horse he rode, the day of my arrival, which I had greatly commended—I found him as good as he is handsome; but above all, perfectly well broke, and well trained, having a good mouth, easy in hand, and stopping short in a gallop without bearing the bit—I mention these minute particulars, because it is the general himself who breaks all his own horses; and he is a very excellent and bold horseman, leaping the highest fences, and going extremely quick, without standing upon his stirrups, bearing on the bridle, or letting his horse run wild,—circumstances which young men look upon as so essential a part of English horsemanship, that they would rather break a leg or an arm than renounce them."

Comparatively few farmers in Virginia kept sheep, yet as early as 1758 Washington's overseer at Mount Vernon reported sixty-five old sheep and forty-eight lambs; seven years later the total number was one hundred fifty-six. The next year he records that he "put my English Ram Lamb to 65 Ewes," so that evidently he was trying to improve the breed. What variety this ram belonged to he does not say. Near the end of his career he had some of Bakewell's breed, an English variety that put on fat rapidly and hence were particularly desirable for mutton.

During his long absences from home his sheep suffered grievously, for sheep require a skilled care that few of his managers or overseers knew how to give. But sheep were an important feature of the English agriculture that he imitated, and he persisted in keeping them. In 1793 he had over six hundred.

"Before I left home in the spring of 1789," he wrote to Arthur Young, "I had improved that species of my stock so much as to get 5-1/4 lbs of Wool as the average of the fleeces of my whole flock,—and at the last shearing they did not yield me 2-1/2 lbs.—By procuring (if I am able) good rams and giving the necessary attention, I hope to get them up again for they are with me, as you have declared them to be with you, that part of my stock in which I most delight."

In 1789, by request, he sent Young "a fleece of a midling size and quality." Young had this made up into cloth and returned it to the General.

In 1793 we find our Farmer giving such instructions to Whiting as to cull out the unthrifty sheep and transform them into mutton and to choose a few of the best young males to keep as rams. Whiting, however, did not manage the flock well, for the following February we find Pearce, the new manager, writing:

"I am sorry to have to inform you that the stock of sheep at Both Union and Dogue Run farms are Some of them Dicing Every Week—& a great many of Them will be lost, let what will be done—Since I came I have had shelters made for them & Troughs to feed them In & to give them salt—& have attended to them myself & was In hopes to have saved those that I found to be weak, but they were too far gone—and Several of the young Cattle at Dogue Run was past all Recovery when I come & some have died already & several more I am afraid must die before spring, they are so very poor and weak."

Washington, according to his own account, was the first American to attempt the raising of mules. Soon after the Revolution he asked our representative in Spain to ascertain whether it would be possible "to procure permission to extract a Jack ass of the best breed." At that time the exportation of these animals from Spain was forbidden by law, but Florida Blanca, the Spanish minister of state, brought the matter to the attention of the king, who in a fit of generosity proceeded to send the American hero two jacks and two jennets. One of the jacks died on the way over, but the other animals, in charge of a Spanish caretaker, reached Boston, and Washington despatched an overseer to escort them to Mount Vernon, where they arrived on the fifth of December, 1785. An interpreter named Captain Sullivan was brought down from Alexandria, and through him the General propounded to the caretaker many grave inquiries regarding the care of the beasts, the answers being carefully set down in writing.



"Royal Gift," as he was duly christened, probably by the negro groom, Peter, who seems to have considered it beneath his dignity to minister to any but royalty, was a large animal. According to careful measurements taken on the porch at Mount Vernon he was fifteen hands high, and his body and limbs were very large in proportion to his height; his ears were fourteen inches long, and his vocal cords were good. He was, however, a sluggish beast, and the sea voyage had affected him so unfavorably that for some time he was of little use. In letters to Lafayette and others Washington commented facetiously upon the beast's failure to appreciate "republican enjoyment." Ultimately, however, "Royal Gift" recovered his strength and ambition and proved a valuable piece of property. He was presently sent on a lour of the South, and while in South Carolina was in the charge of Colonel William Washington, a hero of the Cowpens and many other battles. The profits from the tour amounted to $678.64, yet poor "Royal Gift" seems to have experienced some rough usage on the way thither, arriving lame and thin and in a generally debilitated condition. The General wrote to the Colonel about it thus:

"From accounts which I have received from some gentlemen in Virginia he was most abominably treated on the journey by the man to whom he was entrusted;—for, instead of moving him slowly and steadily along as he ought, he was prancing (with the Jack) from one public meeting or place to another in a gate which could not but prove injurious to an animal who had hardly ever been out of a walk before—and afterward, I presume, (in order to recover lost time) rushed him beyond what he was able to bear the remainder of the journey."

No doubt the beast aroused great curiosity along the way among people who had never before set eyes upon such a creature. We can well believe that the cry, "General Washington's jackass is coming!" was always sufficient to attract a gaping crowd. And many would be the sage comments upon the animal's voice and appearance.

In 1786 Lafayette sent Washington from the island of Malta another jack and two jennets, besides some Chinese pheasants and partridges. The animals landed at Baltimore in November and reached Mount Vernon in good condition later in the month. To Campion, the man who accompanied them, Washington gave "30 Louis dores for his trouble." The new jack, the "Knight of Malta," as he was called, was a smaller beast than "Royal Gift," and his ears measured only twelve inches, but he was well formed and had the ferocity of a tiger.

By crossing the two strains Washington ultimately obtained a jack called "Compound," who united in his person the size and strength of the "Gift" with the courage and activity of the "Knight." The General also raised many mules, which he found to be good workers and more cheaply kept in condition than horses.

Henceforward the peaceful quiet of Mount Vernon was broken many times a day by sounds which, if not musical or mellifluous, were at least jubilant and joyous.

Evidently the sounds in no way disturbed the General, for in 1788 we find him describing the acquisitions in enthusiastic terms to Arthur Young. He called the mules "a very excellent race of animals," cheap to keep and willing workers. Recalling, perhaps, that a king's son once rode upon a mule, he proposes to breed heavy ones from "Royal Gift" for draft purposes and lighter ones from the "Knight" for saddle or carriage. He adds: "Indeed in a few years, I intend to drive no other in my carriage, having appropriated for the sole purpose of breeding them, upwards of twenty of my best mares."

Ah, friend George, what would the world not give to see thee and thy wife Martha driving in the Mount Vernon coach down Pennsylvania Avenue behind four such long-eared beasts!

In all his stock raising, as in most other matters, Washington was greatly hampered by the carelessness of his overseers and slaves. It is notorious that free negroes will often forget or fail to water and feed their own horses, and it may easily be believed that when not influenced by fear, slaves would neglect the stock of their master. Among the General's papers I have found a list of the animals that died upon his Mount Vernon estate from April 16, 1789, to December 25, 1790. In that period of about twenty months he lost thirty-three horses, thirty-two cattle and sixty-five sheep! Considering the number of stock he had, a fifth of that loss would have been excessive. During most of the period he was away from home looking after the affairs of the nation and in his absence his own affairs suffered.

Hardly a report of his manager did not contain some bad news. Thus one of January, 1791, states that "the Young black Brood Mare, with a long tail, which Came from Pennsylvania, said to be four Years old next spring ... was found with her thigh broke quite in two." This happened on the Mansion House farm. On another farm a sheep was reported to have been killed by dogs while a second had died suddenly, perhaps from eating some poisonous plant.

Dogs, in fact, constituted an ever present menace to the sheep and it was only by constant watchfulness that the owner kept his negroes from overrunning the place with worthless curs. In 1792 he wrote to his manager: "I not only approve of your killing those Dogs which have been the occasion of the late loss, & of thinning the Plantations of others, but give it as a positive order that after saying what dog, or dogs shall remain, if any negro presumes under any pretence whatsoever, to preserve, or bring one into the family, that he shall be severely punished, and the dog hanged.—I was obliged to adopt this practice whilst I resided at home, and from the same motive, that is for the preservation of my Sheep and Hogs.... It is not for any good purpose Negroes raise, and keep dogs; but to aid them in their night robberies; for it is astonishing to see the command under which the dogs are."

After the Revolution, in imitation of English farmers, he made use of hurdles in pasturing sheep and milk cows. Thereby he secured more even distribution of the manure, which was one of his main objects in raising stock.

Washington's interest in cattle seems to have been less intense than was the case with some other kinds of stock. He always had a great number of cows, bulls, oxen and calves upon his farms—in 1793 over three hundred "black cattle" of all sorts. He was accustomed to brand his cattle with the letters "G.W.," the location of the brand on the body indicating the farm on which the beast was raised. To what extent he endeavored to improve the breed of his cattle I am unable to say, but I have found that as early as 1770 he owned an English bull, which in July he killed and sold to the crew of the British frigate Boston, which lay in the Potomac off his estate. In 1797 he made inquiries looking toward the purchase of an improved bull calf from a cattle breeder named Gough, but upon learning that the price was two hundred dollars he decided not to invest. Gough, however, heard of Washington's interest in his animals, and being an admirer of the General, gave him a calf. An English farmer, Parkinson, who saw the animal in 1798, describes him in terms the reverse of enthusiastic, and of this more hereafter.

A large part of the heavy work on all the farms was done by oxen. In November, 1785, there were thirteen yoke of these beasts on the Mount Vernon estate and the number was sometimes still larger. In 1786 Washington recorded putting "a Collar on a large Bull in order to break him to the draft.—at first he was sulky and restive but came to by degrees." The owner always aimed to have enough oxen broken so that none would have to be worked too hard, but he did not always succeed in his aim. When they attained the age of eight years the oxen were usually fattened and killed for beef.

The management of the milk cows seems to have been very poor. In May, 1793, we find the absent owner writing to his manager: "If for the sake of making a little butter (for which I shall get scarcely anything) my calves are starved, & die, it may be compared to stopping the spigot, and opening the faucit." Evidently the making of butter was almost totally discontinued, for in his last instructions, completed only a few days before his death, he wrote: "And It is hoped and will be expected, that more effectual measures will be pursued to make butter another year; for it is almost beyond belief, that from 101 Cows actually reported on a late enumeration of the Cattle, that I am obliged to buy butter for the use of my family."

In his later years he became somewhat interested in the best methods of feeding cattle and once suggested that the experiment be tried of fattening one bullock on potatoes, another on corn, and a third on a mixture of both, "keeping an exact account of the time they are fatting, and what is eaten of each, and of hay, by the different steers; that a judgment may be formed of the best and least expensive mode of stall feeding beef for market, or for my own use."

During his early farming operations his swine probably differed little if at all from the razor-backs of his neighbors. They ranged half wild in the woods in summer and he once expressed the opinion that fully half the pigs raised were stolen by the slaves, who loved roast pork fully as well as did their master. In the fall the shoats were shut up to fatten. More than a hundred were required each year to furnish meat for the people on the estate; the average weight was usually less than one hundred forty pounds. Farmers in the Middle West would to-day have their Poland Chinas or Durocs of the same age weighing two hundred fifty to three hundred pounds. Still the smallness of Washington's animals does not necessarily indicate such bad management as may at first glance appear. Until of considerable size the pigs practically made their own living, eating roots and mast in the woods, and they did not require much grain except during fattening time. And, after all, as the story has it, "what's time to a hawg?"

In his later years he seems to have taken more interest in his pigs. By 1786 he had decided that when fattening they ought to be put into closed pens with a plank floor, a roof, running water and good troughs. A visitor to Mount Vernon in 1798 says that he had "about 150 of the Guinea kind, with short legs and hollow back," so it is evident that he was experimenting with new breeds. These Guinea swine were red in color, and it is said that the breed was brought to America from west Africa by slave traders. It was to these animals that Washington fed the by-products of his distillery.

In the slaughtering of animals he tried experiments as he did in so many other matters. In 1768 he killed a wether sheep which weighed one hundred three pounds gross. He found that it made sixty pounds of meat worth three pence per pound, five and a half of tallow at seven and a half pence, three of wool at fifteen pence, and the skin was worth one shilling and three pence, a total of L1.3.5. One object of such experiments was to ascertain whether it was more profitable to butcher animals or sell them on the hoof.

Washington also raised chickens, turkeys, swans, ducks, geese and various other birds and beasts. In 1788 Gouverneur Morris sent him two Chinese pigs and with them "a pair of Chinese geese, which are really the foolishest geese I ever beheld; for they choose all times for setting but in the spring, and one of them is even now [November] actually engaged in that business." Of some golden pheasants that had been brought from China the General said that before seeing the birds he had considered that pictures of them must be "only works of fancy, but now I find them to be only Portraits."

The fact is that his friends and admirers sent him so many feathered or furred creatures that toward the end of his life he was the proprietor of a considerable zoo.

Notwithstanding mismanagement by his employees and slaves, Washington accumulated much valuable domestic stock. In his will, made the year of his death, he lists the following: "1 Covering horse, 5 Cob. horses—4 Riding do—Six brood mares—20 working horses and mares,—2 Covering jacks & 3 young ones 10 she asses—42 working mules—15 younger ones. 329 head of horned cattle. 640 head of Sheep, and the large stock of hogs, the precise number unknown." He further states that his manager believes the stock worth seven thousand pounds, but he conservatively sets it down at fifteen thousand six hundred fifty-three dollars.



CHAPTER X

THE HORTICULTURIST AND LANDSCAPE GARDENER

Washington's work as a horticulturist prior to the educating influences of the Revolution was mostly utilitarian. That he had a peach orchard as early as 1760 is proven by an entry in his diary for February 22: "Laid in part, the Worm of a fence round the Peach orchard." Just where this orchard stood I am not quite certain, but it was probably on the slope near the old tomb.

He learned how to propagate and "wed" his own trees and in 1763 was particularly active. On March 21st he recorded that he had "Grafted 40 cherries, viz 12 Bullock Hearts, 18 very fine May Cherry, 10 Coronation. Also grafted 12 Magnum Bonum Plums. Also planted 4 Nuts of the Mediterranean Pame in the Pen where the Chestnut grows—sticks by East. Note, the Cherrys and Plums came from Collo. Masons Nuts from Mr. Gr[een's.] Set out 55 cuttings of the Madeira Grape."

A little later he grafted quinces on pear and apple stocks; also he grafted "Spanish pairs," "Butter pears," "Bergamy Pears," "Newtown Pippins," "43 of the Maryland Red Strick," etc., and transplanted thirty-five young crab scions. These scions he obtained by planting the pumice of wild crab apples from which cider had been made. They were supposed to make hardier stocks than those grown from ordinary seeds.

He grafted many cherries, plums, etc., in March, 1764, and yet again in the spring of 1765, when he put English mulberry scions on wild mulberry stocks. In that year "Peter Green came to me a Gardener." In 1768 and 1771 he planted grapes in the inclosure below the vegetable garden and in March, 1775, he again grafted cherries and also planted peach seeds and seeds of the "Mississippi nut" or pecan.

Long before this he had begun to gather fruits from his early trees and vines. Being untroubled by San Jose scale and many other pests that now make life miserable to the fruit grower, he grew fine products and no doubt enjoyed them.

His esthetic sense was not yet fully developed, but he was always desirous of having his possessions make a good appearance, and by 1768 was beginning to think of beautifying his grounds. In that year he expressed a wish that he later carried out, namely to have about his mansion house every possible specimen of native tree or shrub noted for beauty of form, leaf or flower.

Even amid the trials of the Revolution this desire was not forgotten. In 1782 he directed Lund Washington, his manager, to plant locusts and other ornamental trees and shrubs at the ends of the house. He wrote that such trees would be more likely to live if taken from the open fields than from the woods because the change of environment would be less pronounced. To what extent the work was carried I have been unable to ascertain, for, as elsewhere stated, very little of his correspondence with his manager during these years survives.

He returned from the Revolution with a strong desire to beautify his estate, a desire in part due no doubt to seeing beautiful homes elsewhere and to contact with cultured people, both Americans and foreigners. One of his first tasks was to rebuild and enlarge his house. From a small house of eight rooms he transformed Mount Vernon into the present large mansion, ninety-six feet and four inches long by thirty-two feet in depth, with two floors and an attic, an immense cellar and the magnificent portico overlooking the Potomac. The plans and specifications he drew with his own hands, and those who have visited the place will hardly deny that the mansion fits well into its setting and that, architects tell us, is a prime consideration. The flagstones for the floor of the portico he imported from Whitehaven, England, and these still remain in place, though many are cracked or broken.

The portico runs the entire length of the house, is over fourteen feet deep and its floor is one hundred twenty-four feet ten and one-half inches above high water-mark, according to calculations made by Washington himself. From it one commands miles of the Potomac and of the Maryland shore and there are few such noble prospects in America. Washington owned a telescope and spy glasses and with them could watch the movements of ships and boats on the river. The portico was a sort of trysting place for the family and visitors on summer afternoons and evenings, and some of the thirty or so Windsor chairs bought for it are still in existence.



This was the second time our Farmer reconstructed his house, as in 1758-60 he had made numerous alterations[6]. In 1758 he paid John Patterson L328.0.5 for work done upon it, and the whole house was pretty thoroughly renovated and remodeled in preparation for the reception of a new mistress. In March, 1760, we find the owner contracting with William Triplett "to build me two houses in front of my house (plastering them also) and running walls to them from the great house and from the great house to the washouse and kitchen also." By the "front" he means the west front, as that part toward the river is really the rear of the mansion. Hitherto the house had stood detached and these walls were the originals of the colonnades, still a noticeable feature of the building.

[6] In 1775 a Frenchman was engaged to panel the main hall and apply stucco ornaments to the ceilings of the parlor and dining-room.

Owing to the absence of a diary of his home activities during 1784 we can not trace in detail his work that year upon either his house or grounds, but we know such facts as that he was ordering materials for the house and that he had his French friend Malesherbes and others collecting vines and plants for him.

With January 1, 1785, he began a new diary, and from it we ascertain that on the twelfth, on a ride about his estate, he observed many trees and shrubs suitable for transplanting. Thereafter he rarely rode out without noticing some crab, holly, magnolia, pine or other young tree that would serve his purpose. He was more alive to the beauties of nature than he had once been, or at least more inclined to comment upon them. On an April day he notes that "the flower of the Sassafras was fully out and looked well—an intermixture of this and Red bud I conceive would look very pretty—the latter crowned with the former or vice versa." He was no gushing spring poet, but when the sap was running, the flowers blooming and the birds singing he felt it all in his heart—perhaps more deeply than do some who say more about it.

On January 19th of this year he began laying out his grounds on a new plan. This plan, as completed, provided for sunken walls or "Haw has!" at the ends of the mansion, and on the west front a large elliptical lawn or bowling green such as still exists there. Along the sides of the lawn he laid out a serpentine drive or carriage way, to be bordered with a great variety of shade trees on each side and a "Wilderness" on the outside. At the extreme west, where the entrance stood, the trees were omitted so that from the house one could see down a long vista, cut through the oaks and evergreens, the lodge gate three-quarters of a mile away. On each side of the opening in the lawn stood a small artificial mound, and just in front of the house a sun-dial by which each day, when the weather was clear, he set his watch. A sun-dial stands on the same spot now but, alas, it is not the original. That was given away or sold by one of the subsequent owners.

This same spring our Farmer records planting ivy, limes and lindens sent by his good friend Governor Clinton of New York; lilacs, mock oranges, aspen, mulberries, black gums, berried thorns, locusts, sassafras, magnolia, crabs, service berries, catalpas, papaws, honey locusts, a live oak from Norfolk, yews, aspens, swamp berries, hemlocks, twelve horse chestnut sent by "Light Horse Harry" Lee, twelve cuttings of tree box, buckeye nuts brought by him the preceding year from the mouth of Cheat River, eight nuts from a tree called "the Kentucke Coffee tree," a row of shell bark hickory nuts from New York, some filberts from "sister Lewis." His brother John sent him four barrels of holly seeds, which he sowed in the semicircle north of the front gate; in the south semicircle, from the kitchen to the south "Haw ha!"; and from the servants' hall to the north "Haw ha!"

Nor did he neglect more utilitarian work, for in April he grafted many cherries, pears and other fruit trees. Such work was continued at intervals till his death.

In raising fruit, as in many other things, he was troubled by the thieving propensities of the slaves. September tenth of this year he records that because of the scarcity of apples and the depredations that were being committed "every Night upon the few I have, I found it necessary (tho much too early) to gather and put them up for Winter use."

The spring of 1785 proved an exceptionally dry one and he was forced to be absent from home several days, leaving the care of the trees and shrubs to his careless lazy servants. He records that they said that they watered them according to directions, but he seems to doubt it. At all events, "Most of my transplanted trees have a sickly look.—The small Pines in the Wilderness are entirely dead.—The larger ones in the Walks, for the most part appear to be alive (as yet)—almost the whole of the Holly are dead—many of the Ivy, wch. before looked healthy & well seem to be declining—few of the Crab trees had put forth leaves; not a single Ash tree has unfolded its buds; whether owing to the trees declining or any other cause, I know not.... The lime trees, which had some appearance of Budding when I went away, are now withering—and the Horse chestnut & Tree box from Colo. Harry Lee's discover little signs of shooting.—the Hemlock is almost entirely dead, & bereft of their leaves;—and so are the live Oak.—In short half the Trees in the Shrubberies & many in the Walk are dead & declin[in]g."

Nevertheless he refused to be discouraged and proceeded to plant forty-eight mahogany tree seeds brought by his nephew, George A. Washington, from the West Indies. He also set out a "Palmetto Royal" in the garden and sowed or planted sandbox trees, palmettos, physic nuts, pride of Chinas, live oaks, accacias, bird peppers, "Caya pepper," privet, guinea grass, and a great variety of Chinese grasses, the names of which, such as "In che fa," "all san fa" "se lon fa," he gravely set down in his diary.

The dry weather continued and presently he notes that all the poplars, black gums and pines, most of the mulberries, all of the crab apples and papaws, most of the hemlock and sassafras, and several of the cedars are dead, while the tops of the live oaks are dead but shoots are coming up from the trunks and roots. The Chinese grasses are in a bad way, and those that have come up are almost entirely destroyed either by insects or drought. None of this grass survived the winter, though he took the trouble to cover it with straw.