down. "My lord
went first," writes Mr. Warrington, in a letter to Mrs. Mountain, at
Castlewood, Virginia, still extant. "He was for having me take the lead;
but, remembering the story about the Battel of Fontanoy which my dearest
George used to tell, I says, 'Monseigneur le Comte, tirez le premier,
s'il vous play.' So he took his run in his stocken feet, and for the
honour of Old Virginia, I had the gratafacation of beating his lordship
by more than two feet--viz., two feet nine inches--me jumping twenty-one
feet three inches, by the drawer's measured tape, and his lordship only
eighteen six. I had won from him about my weight before (which I knew
the moment I set my eye upon him). So he and Mr. Jack paid me these two
betts. And with my best duty to my mother--she will not be displeased
with me, for I bett for the honor of the Old Dominion, and my opponent
was a nobleman of the first quality, himself holding two Erldomes, and
heir to a Duke. Betting is all the rage here, and the bloods and young
fellows of fashion are betting away from morning till night.

"I told them--and that was my mischief perhaps--that there was a
gentleman at home who could beat me by a good foot; and when they asked
who it was, and I said Col. G. Washington, of Mount Vernon--as you know
he can, and he's the only man in his county or mine that can do it--Mr.
Wolfe asked me ever so many questions about Col. G. W., and showed that
he had heard of him, and talked over last year's unhappy campane as
if he knew every inch of the ground, and he knew the names of all our
rivers, only he called the Potowmac Pottamac, at which we had a
good laugh at him. My Lord of March and Ruglen was not in the least
ill-humour about losing, and he and his friend handed me notes out of
their pocket-books, which filled mine that was getting very empty, for
the vales to the servants at my cousin Castlewood's house and buying
a horse at Oakhurst have very nearly put me on the necessity of making
another draft upon my honoured mother or her London or Bristol agent."

These feats of activity over, the four gentlemen now strolled out of the
tavern garden into the public walk, where, by this time, a great deal of
company was assembled: upon whom Mr. Jack, who was of a frank and free
nature, with a loud voice, chose to make remarks that were not always
agreeable. And here, if my Lord March made a joke, of which his lordship
was not sparing, Jack roared, "Oh, ho, ho! Oh, good G