rld, for, if they
have not been actually ennobled in recognition of the deeds of their
great descendant, they have at least become the subjects of intense
and general interest. Every one of the name who could be discovered
anywhere has been dragged forth into the light, and has had all that
was known about him duly recorded and set down. By scanning family
trees and pedigrees, and picking up stray bits of information here and
there, we can learn in a rude and general fashion what manner of men
those were who claimed descent from William of Hertburn, and who bore
the name of Washington in the mother-country. As Mr. Galton passes
a hundred faces before the same highly sensitized plate, and gets a
photograph which is a likeness of no one of his subjects, and yet
resembles them all, so we may turn the camera of history upon these
Washingtons, as they flash up for a moment from the dim past, and hope
to obtain what Professor Huxley calls a "generic" picture of the race,
even if the outlines be somewhat blurred and indistinct.

In the North of England, in the region conquered first by Saxons and
then by Danes, lies the little village of Washington. It came into the
possession of Sir William de Hertburn, and belonged to him at the time
of the Boldon Book in 1183. Soon after, he or his descendants took
the name of De Wessyngton, and there they remained for two centuries,
knights of the palatinate, holding their lands by a military tenure,
fighting in all the wars, and taking part in tournaments with becoming
splendor. By the beginning of the fifteenth century the line of feudal
knights of the palatinate was extinct, and the manor passed from the
family by the marriage of Dionisia de Wessyngton. But the main stock
had in the mean time thrown out many offshoots, which had taken firm
root in other parts and in many counties of England. We hear of
several who came in various ways to eminence. There was the learned
and vigorous prior of Durham, John de Wessyngton, probably one of the
original family, and the name appears in various places after his time
in records and on monuments, indicating a flourishing and increasing
race. Lawrence Washington, the direct ancestor of the first President
of the United States, was, in the sixteenth century, the mayor of
Northampton, and received from King Henry VIII. the manor of Sulgrave
in 1538. In the next century we find traces of Robert Washington of
the Adwick family, a rich merchant of Leeds