As its the greatest mark of friendship and esteem absent Friends
can shew each other in Writing and often communicating their
thoughts to his fellow companions makes me endeavour to signalize
myself in acquainting you from time to time and at all times my
situation and employments of Life and could Wish you would take
half the Pains of contriving me a Letter by any oppertunity as you
may be well assured of its meeting with a very welcome reception
my Place of Residence is at present at His Lordships where I might
was my heart disengag'd pass my time very pleasantly as theres a
very agreeable Young Lady Lives in the same house (Col^o George
Fairfax's Wife's Sister[51]) but as thats only adding Fuel to fire
it makes me the more uneasy for by often and unavoidably being
in Company with her revives my former Passion for your Low Land
Beauty[52] whereas was I to live more retired from yound Women I
might in some measure eliviate my sorrows by burying that chast
and troublesome Passion in the grave of oblivion or etarnall
forgetfulness for as I am very well assured thats the only antidote
or remedy that I ever shall be releivd by or only recess that can
administer any cure or help to me as I am well convinced was I ever
to attempt any thing I should only get a denial which would be only
adding grief to uneasiness
[Footnote 51: The young lady indicated was Miss Mary Cary, the
daughter of Colonel Wilson Cary, of Ceeleys Hampton, Elisabeth
City county, Va. For 34 years Mr. Cary was collector of customs
for the lower James river district, and a man of large wealth and
aristocratic notions. He had four daughters: Sarah, who married
George W. Fairfax, of "Belvoir"; Mary, who married in 1754, Edward
Ambler of Jamestown; Anna, who married Robert Carter Nicholas;
and Elizabeth, who married Rev. Bryan, 8th Lord Fairfax. Col.
Cary had also one son Wilson Miles Cary, who was a member of the
Convention of Virginia in 1776. Some writers have confounded him
with his father. Bishop Meade in his _Old Churches and Families
of Virginia_, accepts traditions which other writers claim are
authenticated by documents, preserved by the Ambler family, and
accordingly his account credits the story that Washington, in his
youth, was an ardent admirer of Miss Mary Cary, and solicited
leave of Col. Cary to address his daughter, but was refused.
(See _Meade_, vol. i, 108.) This draft of the letter addressed
to "Dear Friend Robin," was probably made in the spring of 1748,
when Washington was in his seventeenth year. In it, he playfully
avows an admiration for the "lowland beauty" and, at the same time,
admits the agreeableness of the "young lady in the house" with him
at "Belvoir." Mr. Edward Ambler, educated at Cambridge, England,
was collector for York river and a burgess for Jamestown. He died
in 1768 in his thirty-fifth year and was buried at Jamestown;
his widow survived him until 1781. Mrs. Ambler with her children
and her sister, Mrs. Fairfax, were occasionally guests at Mount
Vernon, as Washington's diaries show. I am inclined to believe that
while it is true that Washington entertained a high regard for the
Cary family and particularly the ladies, there is nothing but the
lightest gossip to create an inference that there ever was even an
incipient affair of the heart between either of the Misses Cary and
Washington.]
[Footnote 52: Lowland beauty.--Who this object of Washington's
early admiration was, if she had a veritable existence, is not
positively known. Irving, followed by Everett and others, accepts
the tradition, or rather surmises, that this sobriquet referred to
Miss Lucy Grymes of Westmoreland county, who in 1753 married Henry
Lee, Esq. Their son was the gallant General Henry Lee, "Lighthorse
Harry," of the Revolution. Some recent writers, affect to believe
that this draft of a letter is conclusive that there was a real
love affair but that Betsy Fauntleroy, of Fredericksburg, Va.,
was the person referred to, and have published a letter purporting
to have been addressed by Washington to William Fauntleroy, Sr.,
Esq., in Richmond, enclosing one to Miss Betsy, who, it is made
to appear, had also refused Washington's addresses. Letters and
traditions of this character should be received with caution, for
while vague reports and surmises of an affair of the heart may be
dilated upon in a bantering way among friends of the parties where
there is little or no foundation for the allegation, yet they
should be subjected to scrutiny and some positive evidence adduced
before they are accepted as historical facts.]