Af-ter his fa-ther's death George made his home with his broth-er, Au-gus-tine, un-til he was six-teen (16) years old; and the short notes which he wrote to his moth-er were not like those he sent to his boy-friends, or like those which you boys and girls write to-day. He be-gan, "Hon-ored Mad-am;" and end-ed the stiff lit-tle note,—"Your du-ti-ful son."
In those days folks lived on great big farms, or plan-ta-tions, as they were called, and raised to-bac-co, which was sold for much mon-ey in Eng-land. George's fa-ther had a ver-y large plan-ta-tion and ma-ny slaves to work on it; some day this would all be-long to George, and so he was taught how to write in a big round hand, how to do sums, and to look out for those who were in his care.
All through these years there was talk of war; for a cru-el war be-tween the French and Eng-lish, known as King George-'s War, had be-gun; and the boys, who heard so much talk of war, of course played at it; and George was ev-er at the head, ev-er lead-ing these bands of young sol-diers;
he longed, just as boys would to-day, to throw a-way his books, to leave school, to go to the true war and bear a real gun; and when he was fif-teen, his broth-er Law-rence, who was a sol-dier, tried to make his moth-er let him join the na-vy, as he was too young to go to the war. But this moth-er was a ver-y wise wo-man, and said no; that his place was at home un-til he knew how to care for the great plan-ta-tion and the ma-ny slaves that in five or six years would be his.
Now, at this time, this great land of ours was so wild that it was hard to tell how much land a man owned, just where one great farm end-ed and the next be-gan; and a man who knew the land so well that he could tell folks just these things would be of much use; so George now be-gan to give much time to just this work; and so well did he do it that soon folks came to him when they were in doubt.
In fact this work led, as you shall see, straight up to the pres-i-dent's seat. His broth-er Law-rence had mar-ried Anne Fair-fax, and in their home at Mt. Ver-non George met ma-ny great men; a-mong oth-ers was Lord Thom-as Fair-fax, who owned a piece of land so large that he did not know how big it was; he sent George to find this out; and now this young boy had a rough piece of real work to do.
In March, 1748, he and a young friend, George Wil-liam Fair-fax, left the ease of Mt. Ver-non to live in the wild woods, where they would see on-ly Indians, or, at the best, rough white men; in the log huts of the white men they found so much dirt that, af-ter one tri-al, rath-er than sleep on dir-ty straw, with no sheet, and but one torn, thin blan-ket, they ei-ther lay on the bare floor, near the big wood-fire, or else built a huge fire in the woods and lay close to it on the earth. They had to swim their hors-es o-ver streams; they
shot wild deer and birds, and of-ten cooked and ate them, alone in the great wild woods, far from e-ven the camp of the In-di-ans. Once, at least, we know, from a little book in which each night George wrote of what they had done that day, that they saw a grand war-dance of the In-di-ans; the mu-sic by which they danced was made by a pot half full of wa-ter, with a deer-skin o-ver the top, and a gourd filled with shot; this must have made queer mu-sic to dance by.
MOUNT VERNON—THE HOME OF WASHINGTON.