Guests crowded upon him, and he was especially glad to see his old comrades. A visit from Lafayette was the occasion of a very gay time, when Mount Vernon was full of visitors, and the days were given to sport.
Washington had constant applications from persons who wished to write his life or paint his portrait. There was a sculptor named Wright who undertook to get a model of Washington's face. "Wright came to Mount Vernon," so Washington tells the story, "with the singular request that I should permit him to take a model of my face, in plaster of Paris, to which I consented with some reluctance. He oiled my features, and placing me flat upon my back, upon a cot, proceeded to daub my face with the plaster. Whilst I was in this ludicrous attitude, Mrs. Washington entered the room, and seeing my face thus overspread with the plaster, involuntarily exclaimed. Her cry excited in me a disposition to smile, which gave my mouth a slight twist, or compression of the lips, that is now observable in the busts which Wright afterward made." A more successful sculptor was Houdon, who was commissioned by Virginia to make a statue of Washington. He also took a plaster model, and the fine statue which he made stands in Richmond. A portrait painter, named Pine, also paid a visit to Mount Vernon about this time with a letter from one of Washington's friends to whom Washington wrote during Pine's visit:
"'In for a penny, in for a pound,' is an old adage. I am so hackneyed to the touches of the painter's pencil, that I am now altogether at their beck, and sit, like 'patience on a monument,' whilst they are delineating the lines of my face. It is a proof among many others of what habit and custom can effect. At first I was as impatient at the request, and as restive under the operation as a colt is of the saddle. The next time I submitted very reluctantly, but with less flouncing. Now no dray moves more readily to the thill than I do to the painter's chair. It may easily be conceived, therefore, that I yielded a ready obedience to your request, and to the views of Mr. Pine."
Washington was a most considerate and courteous host. He was very fond of young people, but his silent ways and the reputation which he enjoyed as a great man made it difficult for the young always to be easy in his presence. The story is told of his coming into a room once, when dancing was going on, and the sport suddenly ceased. Washington begged the young people to go on, but they refused until he left the room. Then, after they felt free again to dance, he came back and peeped through the open door.
ONE OF A SET OF FIRE-BUCKETS AT MOUNT VERNON.
He was very apt to affect older people in the same way. He was a large man, with large hands and feet, and eyes that looked steadily at one. When not speaking, he was very apt to forget there were other people in the room, and his lips would move as he talked to himself while thinking hard upon some matter. But he did not neglect people. One of his visitors tells this story: "The first evening I spent under the wing of his hospitality, we sat a full hour at table, by ourselves, without the least interruption, after the family had retired. I was extremely oppressed with a severe cold and excessive coughing, contracted from the exposure of a harsh winter journey. He pressed me to use some remedies, but I declined doing so. As usual, after retiring, my coughing increased. When some time had elapsed, the door of my room was gently opened and, on drawing my bed-curtains, to my utter astonishment I beheld Washington himself standing at my bed-side, with a bowl of hot tea in his hand. I was mortified and distressed beyond expression."
HOUDON’S STATUE OF WASHINGTON.
Although Washington had now retired to Mount Vernon, and seemed perfectly willing to spend the rest of his days as a country gentleman, it was impossible for him to do so. The leaders of the country needed him, and he was himself too deeply interested in affairs to shut his eyes and ears. He was especially interested in the Western country, which then meant the Ohio Valley and the region bordered by the Great Lakes. In the autumn of 1784, he made a tour beyond the Alleghanies, for the purpose of looking after the lands which he owned there; but he looked about him not only as a land-owner, but as a wise, far-seeing statesman.