Time soothed the wounds naught else could heal, and the young widow discharged the duties that belonged to her position. The trust her husband reposed in her—in leaving their large property in her own hands to control—she amply vindicated, and her estate was one of the best managed in the county. When she met Colonel Washington she was twenty-six years of age, and was remarkably youthful in appearance and very handsome. She had ever been the object of warm and disinterested affection, and from her first entrance into the society of Williamsburg, down to the last hour of her life, it was eminently illustrated. Few had been her sorrows, and for each and every one endured she could count a twofold blessing. There was nothing in her life to foster the faults incident to human nature, for the rank weeds of poverty and lack of opportunity, which cramp and deform so many earth-lives, were unfelt and unknown to her.
Mount Vernon was the gift to Colonel Washington from his elder and bachelor brother Lawrence, and the estate was then one of the finest in Virginia. Washington had made it his occasional residence before his marriage, but it was not until he took his bride there that it became his permanent home. The life that Mrs. Washington led there was similar in outward circumstances to her former position as Mrs. Custis, for she was again the wife of a wealthy, prosperous planter, the centre of the refined society of the county. The sameness of country life was interrupted by her frequent trips with her husband to Williamsburg, where he was for fifteen successive years a member of the Legislature.
“How noiseless falls the foot of time
That only treads on flowers!”
Engaged in fascinating pleasures and congenial pursuits, it did not occur to Mrs. Washington how many summers of fragrantly blooming flowers and ripening fruits had sunk into the unreturning past; nor did she consider that the long term of years in which she had been so happy had meted to others measured drops of bitterness, turning all their harvest-times into chilling, dreary winter. There came to her a time when the pleasant home-life had to be abandoned, and for eight years the harmony of domestic peace was banished.
The following letter, the only one preserved of the many addressed to her, is full of interest, and is replete with that thoughtfulness which characterized Washington in his capacity as a husband. Mrs. Washington, shortly before her death, destroyed every testimonial of this kind, unwilling that any other should read these evidences of affection:
“Philadelphia, 18th June, 1775.
“My Dearest: I am now set down to write to you on a subject which fills me with inexpressible concern, and this concern is greatly aggravated and increased when I reflect upon the uneasiness I know it will give you. It has been determined in Congress that the whole army raised for the defence of the American cause shall be put under my care, and that it is necessary for me to proceed immediately to Boston to take upon me the command of it.
“You may believe me, my dear Patsy, when I assure you, in the most solemn manner, that, so far from seeking this appointment, I have used every endeavor in my power to avoid it, not only from my unwillingness to part with you and the family, but from a consciousness of its being a trust too great for my capacity, and that I should enjoy more real happiness in one month with you at home, than I have the most distant prospects of finding abroad if my stay were to be seven times seven years. But as it has been a kind of destiny that has thrown me upon this service, I shall hope that my undertaking it is designed to answer some good purpose. You might, and I suppose did, perceive, from the tenor of my letter, that I was apprehensive I could not avoid this appointment, as I did not pretend to intimate when I should return. That was the case. It was utterly out of my power to refuse this appointment, without exposing my character to such censures as would have reflected dishonor upon myself, and given pain to my friends. This, I am sure, could not and ought not to be pleasing to you, and must have lessened me considerably in my own esteem. I shall rely, therefore, confidently on that Providence which has heretofore preserved and been bountiful to me, not doubting but that I shall return safe to you in the fall. I shall feel no pain from the toil or danger of the campaign; my unhappiness will flow from the uneasiness I know you will feel from being left alone. I therefore beg that you will summon your whole fortitude, and pass your time as agreeably as possible. Nothing else will give me so much sincere satisfaction as to hear this, and to hear it from your own pen. My earnest and ardent desire is, that you would pursue any plan that is most likely to produce content and a tolerable degree of tranquillity, as it must add greatly to my uneasy feelings to hear that you are dissatisfied or complaining at what I really could not avoid.
“As life is always uncertain, and common prudence dictates to every man the necessity of settling his temporal concerns while it is in his power, I have, since I came to this place—for I had no time to do it before I left home—got Colonel Pendleton to draft a will for me by the directions I gave him, which I will now enclose. The provisions made for you, in case of my death, will, I hope, be agreeable. I shall add nothing more, as I have several letters to write, but to desire that you will remember me to your friends, and to assure you that I am, with the most unfeigned regard, my dear Patsy,