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won £11. 7. 6 and lost £9, which was somewhat better than his average.

It was a vast improvement over his disastrous season at Williamsburg in March, 1772, when he won £17. 17. 6 in five games and lost in twelve games no less than £39. 11. 3.

He apparently played cards no more in 1774, for in his Ledger B., where he devotes two great pages to a study of his card business, he stops here, having begun the record January 2, 1772, with a loss of £6. 2, his first winning of £2. 3. 6 being on February 28. He mentions no gambling accounts after this Williamsburg trip of 1774, but does slip in a winning of £7 at Philadelphia in October, in order to sweeten the bitter a little.

Then he totals his losses as £78. 5. 9, and his winnings at £72. 2. 6, and closes the double entry with:

“1775 Jan. 1

By Balce against Play from Jan 1772

to this date

£6.3.3"

Which was not bad for sixty-three games, of which he lost 36 and won 27. At his own home he won only five times with an intake of £15. 17, and lost thirteen times with an output of £16. 16. 6.

It is picturesque to find him playing so hard during the most epic legislative sessions, and it is evident that he did. not share John Adams' contempt for card-playing, of which he said:

"It gratifies none of the senses, neither sight, hearing, taste, smelling, nor feeling. It can entertain the mind only by hushing its clamours, cards, backgammon, etc., are genteel antidotes to reflection, to thinking-that cruel tyrant within us. They choke the desire for knowledge,' he added. In his early and intellectually priggish days, he confided to his diary his amazement that men could play cards, drink punch and wine, smoke tobacco and swear 'while a hundred of the best books lie on the shelves, desks, and chairs in the same room,'

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WASHINGTON'S OWN ACCOUNT OF HIS

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Washington seems to have cared little for books except on agriculture; but he played for small stakes that he could well afford, and his investments in cards and horses are as nothing compared to those of such men as Charles James Fox, the friend of America, the heroic statesman who made 50 guinea bets on almost anything, and whose extravagances piled up a debt of £140,000 by the time he was twenty-four.

Washington's gambling was what he called his dancing, an "agreeable and innocent amusement." Only a hopeless prig could blame him for it, wish to conceal it, or be scandalized at the mention of it.

It may be interesting in evidence of his activity as a sportsman, that his diaries from January, 1768, to March, 1774, a period of about six years, show that he went fox-hunting 155 times, got nothing 85 times, and killed 71 foxes and one "Rakoon." Fox must have been plentiful about Mount Vernon.

In the same period he went gunning 31 times with no results; hunted duck 9 times with a total bag of 26; hunted deer 6 times and killed 3; hunted pheasants once without result.

Aside from his business of fishing, he went fishing five times for sport.

He went to the theatre 37 times, to race-meets 6 times, to 29 balls, 5 concerts, and 2 "barbicues."

By adding all these festive occasions to the evenings spent at cards, a picture is gained of jovial revelry and love of companionship, and a wise eagerness for happiness.

In days when the Constitution is upheld as something that no true patriot could violate, it is strange to find Washington upholding violations and eventually the wreckage of the only Constitution he then had before him. Like other alleged desecrators, he defended himself by accusing his accusers. And he defended himself on July 4th!

Bryan Fairfax, the religious and eccentric brother of George William Fairfax, could neither approve the oppressions of the British government nor the insubordination of the radicals. He refused, indeed, to run for election as a delegate to the House of Burgesses. He quoted what was said in England, that America was "encroaching," denying the authority of Parliament though it had never been disputed till the Stamp Act.

And Fairfax added the familiar counsel of obedience:

"Whatever we may wish to be the case, it becomes good subjects to submit to the Constitution of their country.'

In a later letter he repeats his plea:

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"Altho' I wish it as much as any one that we were legally exempted from it, yet I hold it clearly that we ought to abide by our Constitution.”

In answer to his arguments, Washington wrote two letters setting forth his views.

On July 4th, 1774, he says that there is no hope of "a humble and dutiful petition to the throne." It is "as clear as the sun in its meridian brightness, that there is a regular, systematic plan formed to fix the right and practice of taxation upon us." 13

He feels strongly that the debts owing to Great Britain must be paid. "Whilst we are accusing others of injustice, we should be just ourselves. Nothing but the last extremity" could justify the non-payment of the debt. "Whether this is now come, is the question."

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In his second letter he attacks again the right of Parliament to tax the colonies. He sees General Gage's conduct as "more becoming a Turkish bashaw. . . . Shall Shall we, after this, whine and cry for relief, when we have already tried it in vain? . . . I think the Parliament of Great Britain. hath no more right to put their hands into my pocket, with

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