Imagination and probability join hands in picturing her on horseback. She was a fearless and expert horsewoman. At thirteen years of age she had owned her own mount, her own plush saddle. Now, at twenty, we find her in "habit, hat, and feather" at home on her own dapple-gray, her brother-in-law's gift—she was too good a horsewoman for mad gallops—"pacing" through the lanes in Westmoreland to and fro from Bonum Creek to Sandy Point, or to Yeocomico church, or to superintend her own fields. Her English habit is of scarlet cloth, long and flowing as to the skirt and tightly fitted as to the bodice. Her hat is of beaver, and hat and floating plume alike are black.
This is a pleasing picture of the mother of our adored Washington, and it is as true a picture as we have authority for drawing. It would have helped much if we could have accepted any one of the portraits claiming to be genuine, although no one of them expresses the type which we may reasonably suppose to have been hers. Her own descendants and the wisest historians declare she left no portrait. A picture, claiming to be such, hangs to-day in Lancaster court-house—one that was genuine was burned in the home of her early married life. Handsome and stately she certainly was. Nor can we suppose from the character developed in her early maternal life, that she mingled to any extent in the gayeties of her time. In no letter, no record of any kind, is her name mentioned until her marriage. She was doubtless always grave, always thoughtful, concerning herself much with her religious duties, industrious in womanly occupations, reverently attentive to the services at Yeocomico church, of which the Eskridge family were members.
We may be sure she was instructed in dancing—the universal accomplishment of the time. The saintly blind preacher, James Waddell, had his daughters, to the great scandal of his Presbyterian followers, taught to dance; his defence being that "no parent has a right to make his children unfit for polite society." Members of the Lee, Corbyn, and other influential families of her neighborhood urged the building of a "Banquetting House"—a rustic casino—in Pickatown's Field in Westmoreland, according to contracts made years before, "to make an Honourable treatment fit to entertain the undertakers thereof, their wives, mistresses (sweethearts) and friends, yearly and every year;" and the "yearly and every year" was likely to be construed, as the merry colonists knew well how to construe all opportunities for pleasure. For despite Francis Makemie, James Waddell, and the truly evangelical priests of the Established Church—of whom there were still some—the times went merrily in old Virginia; and the waters of the York had cooled long ago the fevered blood of the first martyr to freedom; and Benjamin Franklin was composing ballads upon "Blackbeard, the pyrate," to say nothing of rollicking rhymes fit no longer for ears polite; and Patrick Henry, and Richard Henry Lee, and George Washington were yet unborn.
The veil of obscurity which hangs over the unmarried life of Mary Ball will never be lifted. The evidence is all in, the testimony all taken. It is certain that she could hardly escape the social round in the gay society of Westmoreland, and quite as certain that she was not a prominent part of it. When the gardener desires the perfecting of some flower, to bloom but once in a twelve-month, he keeps it secluded in some cool, dark spot—only when well rooted bringing it forth into the sunlight. Thus the mind and character grow best in quiet and seclusion, becoming serene, strong, and superior to petty passions. When Mary Ball's hour was come, when her high vocation was pressed upon her, she was rooted and grounded in all things requisite for her exalted but difficult lot.
The years of which we have no record included the formative period of her life. They were dark years in the religious history of the colony. She could have small help from the clerical guides of the day. Even at the best, a church service was mainly a social function,—prayers hurriedly read, perfunctory sermon of short duration, followed by a social half-hour for the purpose of giving and accepting invitations to dinner. The dinner ended with the inevitable punch bowl, over which the clergyman was often the first to become incapable of pursuing his journey home. It had not been so very long since a rector of the Wicomoco church had reached the limit of irreverence. While administering the Communion of the Lord's Supper, upon tasting the bread, he had cried out to the church warden, "George, this bread is not fit for a dog."[4]
A more unwilling witness against the clergy than good Bishop Meade can hardly be imagined. He tells of one who was for years the president of a jockey club; of another who was an habitué of the bar of a country tavern, often seen reeling to and fro with a bowl of "toddy" in his hands, challenging the passers-by to "come in and have a drink"; of still another who indulged in a fisticuff with some of his vestrymen, floored them, and next Sunday preached a sermon from Nehemiah, "And I contended with them and cursed them and smote certain of them, and plucked off their hair!" (Let us hope they were "Gentlemen" and therefore wore the wigs fashionable in their day. "Plucked off" seems to imply as much.) One of these recreant rectors fought a duel within the grounds of his own church; all of them, according to a report made to the Bishop of London, were either "slothful and negligent" or "debauched and bent on all manner of vices."
No one of the Established Church ever gave his services. They were paid for by the piece or dozen like any other merchantable article. In St. Stephen's parish the vestry book, in 1712, records the price of sermons, for instance, to "Rev. John Bell for eight sermons 450 pounds of tobacco apiece." The Rev. Mr. Lechardy rated his eloquence at a lower figure, "for two sermons 600 pounds of tobacco," etc. Notwithstanding the velvet and lace, the powder, perfume, and high-flown compliments of "the gallants of the early eighteenth century" license of speech was universal. Colonel Byrd, the courtly master of Westover, wrote letters too gross for the pages of a reputable magazine. Swearing among women was as common as in the "spacious times of great Elizabeth." From all this, no tutelage and government, however careful, could insure escape. In spite of all this and more, Mary Ball acquired the refinement and moderation of speech by which she was characterized.