urial character, the inhabitants were true
progenitors of the present metropolis. A newspaper had been established
in 1732, and a theater had existed since 1750. Although the town had a
rural aspect, with its quaint dormer-window houses, its straggling lanes
and roads, and the water-pumps in the middle of the streets, it had the
aspirations of a city, and already much of the metropolitan air.

These were the surroundings in which the boy's literary talent was to
develop. His father was a deacon in the Presbyterian church, a sedate,
God-fearing man, with the strict severity of the Scotch Covenanter,
serious in his intercourse with his family, without sympathy in the
amusements of his children; he was not without tenderness in his nature,
but the exhibition of it was repressed on principle,--a man of high
character and probity, greatly esteemed by his associates. He endeavored
to bring up his children in sound religious principles, and to leave no
room in their lives for triviality. One of the two weekly half-holidays
was required for the catechism, and the only relaxation from the three
church services on Sunday was the reading of "Pilgrim's Progress." This
cold and severe discipline at home would have been intolerable but for
the more lovingly demonstrative and impulsive character of the mother,
whose gentle nature and fine intellect won the tender veneration of
her children. Of the father they stood in awe; his conscientious piety
failed to waken any religious sensibility in them, and they revolted
from a teaching which seemed to regard everything that was pleasant
as wicked. The mother, brought up an Episcopalian, conformed to the
religious forms and worship of her husband, but she was never in
sympathy with his rigid views. The children were repelled from the creed
of their father, and subsequently all of them except one became attached
to the Episcopal Church. Washington, in order to make sure of his
escape, and feel safe while he was still constrained to attend his
father's church, went stealthily to Trinity Church at an early age,
and received the rite of confirmation. The boy was full of vivacity,
drollery, and innocent mischief. His sportiveness and disinclination to
religious seriousness gave his mother some anxiety, and she would
look at him, says his biographer, with a half-mournful admiration, and
exclaim, "O Washington! if you were only good!" He had a love of
music, which became later in life a passion, and