but, however carefully the lad studied the rest, this particular admonition took little root in his mind.  There can be no doubt that Washington during the whole of his life had a soft heart for women, and especially for good-looking ones, and both in his personal intercourse and in his letters he shows himself very much more at ease with them than in his relations with his own sex.  Late in life, when the strong passions of his earlier years were under better control, he was able to write,—­

“Love is said to be an involuntary passion, and it is, therefore, contended that it cannot be resisted.  This is true in part only, for like all things else, when nourished and supplied plentifully with aliment, it is rapid in its progress; but let these be withdrawn and it may be stifled in its birth or much stinted in its growth.  For example, a woman (the same may be said of the other sex) all beautiful and accomplished will, while her hand and heart are undisposed of, turn the heads and set the circle in which she moves on fire.  Let her marry, and what is the consequence?  The madness ceases and all is quiet again.  Why? not because there is any diminution in the charms of the lady, but because there is an end of hope.  Hence it follows, that love may and therefore ought to be under the guidance of reason, for although we cannot avoid first impressions, we may assuredly place them under guard.”

To write thus in one’s sixty-sixth year and to practise one’s theory in youth were, however, very different undertakings.  Even while discussing love so philosophically, the writer had to acknowledge that “in the composition of the human frame, there is a good deal of inflammable matter,” and few have had better cause to know it.  When he saw in the premature engagement of his ward, Jack Custis, the one advantage that it would “in a great measure avoid those little flirtations with other young ladies that may, by dividing the attention, contribute not a little to divide the affection,” it is easy to think of him as looking back to his own boyhood, and remembering, it is to be hoped with a smile, the sufferings he owed to pretty faces and neatly turned ankles.

While still a school-boy, Washington was one day caught “romping with one of the largest girls,” and very quickly more serious likings followed.  As early as 1748, when only sixteen years of age, his heart was so engaged that while at Lord Fairfax’s and enjoying the society of Mary Cary he poured out his feelings to his youthful correspondents “Dear Robin” and “Dear John” and “Dear Sally” as follows: