appointment
of official surveyor of Culpepper County, the salary of which, according
to Boucher, was about fifty pounds Virginia currency a year. The office
was certainly not a very fat berth, for it required the holder to live in
a frontier county, to travel at times, as Washington in his journal noted,
over "ye worst Road that ever was trod by Man or Beast," to sometimes lie
on straw, which once "catch'd a Fire," and we "was luckily Preserved by
one of our Mens waking," sometimes under a tent, which occasionally "was
Carried quite of[f] with ye Wind and" we "was obliged to Lie ye Latter
part of ye night without covering," and at other times driven from under
the tent by smoke. Indeed, one period of surveying Washington described to
a friend by writing,--

"[Since] October Last I have not sleep'd above three Nights or four in a
bed but after Walking a good deal all the Day lay down before the fire
upon a Little Hay Straw Fodder or bearskin which-ever is to be had with
Man Wife and Children like a Parcel of Dogs or Catts & happy's he that
gets the Birth nearest the fire there's nothing would make it pass of
tolerably but a good Reward a Dubbleloon is my constant gain every Day
that the Weather will permit my going out and some time Six Pistoles the
coldness of the Weather will not allow my making a long stay as the
Lodging is rather too cold for the time of Year. I have never had my
Cloths of but lay and sleep in them like a Negro except the few Nights I
have lay'n in Frederick Town."

In 1751, when he was nineteen, Washington bettered his lot by becoming
adjutant of one of the four military districts of Virginia, with a salary
of one hundred pounds and a far less toilsome occupation. This in turn led
up to his military appointment in 1754, which he held almost continuously
till 1759, when he resigned from the service.

Next to a position on the Virginia council, a seat in the House of
Burgesses, or lower branch of the Legislature, was most sought, and this
position had been held by Washington's great-grandfather, father, and
elder brother. It was only natural, therefore, that in becoming the head
of the family George should desire the position. As early as 1755, while
on the frontier, he wrote to his brother in charge of Mount Vernon
inquiring about the election to be held in the county, and asking him to
"come at Colo Fairfax's intentions, and let me know whether he purposes to
offer himself as a candidate." "I