f a lover's choosing, and her
pride and pleasure in wearing them. But little coquette that she was,
she failed to properly transmit her appreciation to the man who was so
eager for it, and at that particular time her attention was entirely
taken up by other diversions, of which, had Hancock known, he would
have considered them far more important than colonial affairs.

To the Fairfield mansion, where Dolly and her aunt were staying, had
come a visitor, young Aaron Burr, a relative of Thaddeus Burr, a
brilliant and fascinating young man, whose cleverness and charming
personality made him very acceptable to the young girl, whose presence
in the house added much zest to his visit, and to whom he paid instant
and marked attention. This roused Aunt Lydia to alarm and
apprehension, for she knew Dorothy's firmness when she made up her
mind on any subject, and feared that the tide of her affection might
turn to this fascinating youth, for Dorothy made no secret of her
enjoyment of his attentions. This should not be, Aunt Lydia decided.

With determination, thinly veiled by courtesy, she walked and talked
and drove and sat with the pair, never leaving them alone together for
one moment, which strict chaperonage Dolly resented, and complained
of to a friend with as much of petulancy as she ever showed, tossing
her pretty head with an air of defiance as she told of Aunt Lydia's
foolishness, and spoke of her new friend as a "handsome young man with
a pretty property."

The more devoted young Burr became to her charming ward, the more
determined became Aunt Lydia that John Hancock should not lose what
was dearer to him than his own life. With the clever diplomacy of
which she was evidently past mistress, she managed to so mold affairs
to her liking that Aaron Burr's visit at Fairfield came to an
unexpectedly speedy end, and, although John Hancock's letters to his
aunt show no trace that he knew of a dangerous rival, yet he seems to
have suddenly decided that if he were to wed the fair Dolly it were
well to do it quickly. And evidently he was still the one enshrined in
her heart, for in the recess of Congress between August first and
September fifth, John Hancock dropped the affairs of the colony
momentarily, and journeyed to Fairfield, never again to be separated
from her who was ever his ideal of womanhood.

On the 28th day of August, 1775, Dorothy Quincy and the patriot, John
Hancock, were married, as was chronicled in the _Ne