er of followers and servants, and, coming
over to Westmoreland County, in the Northern Neck of Virginia,
"took up" extensive tracts of land there, and set about building
manor-houses upon them.

Among these, it is stated, was the original "Stratford" House,
afterward destroyed by fire. It was rebuilt, however, and became the
birthplace of Richard Henry Lee, and afterward of General Robert E.
Lee. We shall speak of it more in detail after finishing, in a few
words, our notice of Richard Lee, its founder, and the founder of the
Lee family in Virginia. He is described as a person of great force of
character and many virtues--as "a man of good stature, comely visage,
enterprising genius, sound head, vigorous spirit, and generous
nature." This may be suspected to partake of the nature of epitaph;
but, of his courage and energy, the proof remains in the action taken
by him in connection with Charles II. Inheriting, it would seem, in
full measure, the royalist and Cavalier sentiments of his family, he
united with Sir William Berkeley, the royal governor, in the irregular
proclamation of Charles II. in Virginia, a year or two before his
reinstallment on the English throne. He had already, it is reported on
the authority of well-supported tradition, made a voyage across the
Atlantic to Breda, where Charles II. was then in exile, and offered
to erect his standard in Virginia, and proclaim him king there. This
proposition the young monarch declined, shrinking, with excellent good
sense, from a renewal, under less favorable circumstances, of the
struggle which terminated at Worcester. Lee was, therefore, compelled
to return without having succeeded in his enterprise; but he had made,
it seems, a very strong impression in favor of Virginia upon the
somewhat frivolous young monarch. When he came to his throne again,
Charles II. graciously wore a coronation-robe of Virginia silk, and
Virginia, who had proved so faithful to him in the hour of his need,
was authorized, by royal decree, to rank thenceforward, in the British
empire, with England, Scotland, and Ireland, and bear upon her shield
the motto, "_En dat Virginia quartam._"

Richard Lee returned, after his unsuccessful mission, to the Northern
Neck, and addressed himself thenceforward to the management of his
private fortunes and the affairs of the colony. He had now become
possessed of very extensive estates between the Potomac and
Rappahannock Rivers and elsewhere. Besides St