ampaign and suffering a serious
illness. He subsequently was promoted to the management of a plantation
and enjoyed Washington's confidence and esteem. It was with a sad heart
that Washington penned in his diary for 1785: "Last night Jno. Alton an
Overseer of mine in the Neck--an old & faithful Servant who has lived
with me 30 odd years died--and this evening the wife of Thos. Bishop,
another old Servant who had lived with me an equal number of years
also died."

The adoption of Mrs. Washington's two youngest grandchildren, Nelly
Custis and George Washington Custis, made necessary the employment of a
tutor. One applicant was Noah Webster, who visited Mount Vernon in 1785,
but for some reason did not engage. A certain William Shaw had charge
for almost a year and then in 1786 Tobias Lear, a native of New
Hampshire and a graduate of Harvard, was employed. It is supposed that
some of the lessons were taught in the small circular building in the
garden; Washington himself refers to it as "the house in the Upper
Garden called the School house."

Lear's duties were by no means all pedagogical and ultimately he became
Washington's private secretary. In Philadelphia he and his family lived
in the presidential mansion. Washington had for him "a particular
friendship," an almost fatherly affection. His interest in Lear's little
son Lincoln was almost as great as he would have bestowed upon his own
grandson. Apropos of the recovery of the child from a serious illness he
wrote in 1793: "It gave Mrs. Washington, myself, and all who knew him
sincere pleasure to hear that our little favourite had arrived safe and
was in good health at Portsmouth--we sincerely wish him a long
continuance of the latter--that he may be always as charming and
promising as he now is--that he may live to be a comfort and blessing to
you--and an ornament to his Country. As a token of my affection for him
I send him a ticket in the lottery that's now drawing in the Federal
City; if it should be his fortune to draw the Hotel, it will add to the
pleasure I feel in giving it."

Truly a rather singular gift for a child, we would think in these days.
Let us see how it turned out. The next May Washington wrote to Lear,
then in Europe on business for the Potomac Navigation Company, of which
he had become president: "Often, through the medium of Mr. Langdon, we
hear of your son Lincoln, and with pleasure, that he continues to be the
healthy and sprightly child he