a boarding-house or inn, as it appears from Washington's correspondence that John Hancock's invitation was not accepted, and that the hospitality of Mistress Dorothy was not put to the severe test mentioned in her husband's letter.

Mrs. Washington had "the smallpox so favorably," to use the phrasing of a letter of the General's to his brother, John Augustine, that early in June he was able to leave her out of danger and ready to start for Mount Vernon. The journey home was, however, delayed for over two months in consequence of the alarm occasioned by Lord Dunmore's final and unsuccessful invasion of the Virginia coast.

It was during Mrs. Washington's stay in Philadelphia that the infamous Hickey, or Tryon, plot against the General's life was exposed. Mingled with her thankfulness over this deliverance there must have been many anxious forebodings in the wife's mind, who realized now, as never before, to what daily and hourly perils her husband's acknowledged ability and high position exposed him.

Mrs. Washington was in Philadelphia as late as the twentieth of August, as she wrote to her sister on that date:

"I am still in this town and noe prospect at present of leaving it. The General is at New

York, he is well, and wrote to me yesterday, and informed me that Lord Dunmore, with part of his fleet was come to General Howe, at Staten Island; that another division of Hessians is expected before they think the regulars will begin their attack on us. Some hear begin to think there will be no battle after all. Last week our boats made another attempt on the ships up the North river, and had grappled a fire-ship with the Phoenix ten minutes, but she got cleare of her and is come down the river. On Saturday last our people burnt one of the tenders. I thank God we shant want men. The Army at New York is very large, and numbers of men are still going. There is at this time in the city four thousand, on their march to the camp, and the Virginians daily expected.

"I doe, my dear sister, most religiously wish there was an end to the war, that we might have the pleasure of meeting again."

Soon after writing this letter Mrs. Washington returned to Mount Vernon, where she spent the anxious months that followed, in which occurred the battles of Long Island, of Harlem Heights and of White Plains, the capture of Fort Washington by the British, and the flight of the Continental troops across New Jersey, disasters which were soon followed by the victories of Trenton and Princeton,

Although the residence of Mr. and Mrs.

Custis was at Abingdon, near Mount Vernon, they always, at General Washington's express desire, joined their mother and made their home with her when she was not in camp with her husband.

VII

CAMP LIFE

ONE of the most interesting chapters in a married life that to some persons may seem to be devoid of romantic incidents, is to be found in the years between 1776 and 1783, when Mrs. Washington, at her own home, watched and waited for tidings from the seat of war, or entered with her husband into the hardships and excitements of camp life. The General always had his wife with him at his winter quarters, when he could make her comfortable, and she afterwards took pride in telling her grandchildren that it had been her fortune to hear the first cannon at the opening and the last at the closing of most of the campaigns of the long war.

Mr. Lossing says that at Morristown, in the beginning of the winter of '77, "the accommodations were so limited and the movements of his troops were so uncertain, that he [the General] thought it not prudent for Mrs. Washington to come to camp." As there was

constant danger from marauding parties of the enemy, and as the army was much reduced by the expiration of enlistments and the large proportion of the men under inoculation, Washington may have discouraged his wife from joining him in the early part of the winter. Later on he was anxious, worried, and finally so ill that grave fears were entertained for his recovery. Bad news travelled fast, even in those days of slow posts, and Mrs. Washington was not a woman whom any thought of danger could keep away from her husband when he needed her. Upon another occasion, when she was in Philadelphia, and the General was ill in Virginia, she wrote that if she did not soon hear of his recovery she would set forth to join him, and if no conveyance was provided for the journey she would go on foot rather than endure the anxiety that she felt when separated from him.

Washington had his Morristown headquarters in the winter and spring of '77 in the Arnold Tavern, on the west side of the "Green," a house kept by Colonel Jacob Arnold, an officer of the Light Horse Guards. Many discouragements marked the early months of this winter. Soon after the arrival of the Commander-inChief, he lost a brave and valued officer, Colonel