Besides these letters
of friendship, there were the schemers everywhere who sought his
counsel and assistance. The notorious Lady Huntington, for example,
pursued him with her project of Christianizing the Indians by means of
a missionary colony in our western region, and her persistent ladyship
cost him a good deal of time and thought, and some long and careful
letters. Then there was the inventor Kumsey, with his steamboat, to
which he gave careful attention, as he did to everything that seemed
to have merit. Another class of correspondents were his officers, who
wanted his aid with Congress and in a thousand other ways, and to
these old comrades he never turned a deaf ear. In this connection also
came the affairs of the Society of the Cincinnati. He took an active
part in the formation of the society, became its head, steered it
through its early difficulties, and finally saved it from the wreck
with which it was threatened by unreasoning popular prejudice. All
these things were successfully managed, but at much expense of time
and thought.
[Illustration: WASHINGTON RESIGNING HIS COMMISSION AT ANNAPOLIS]
Then again, apart from this mass of labor thrust upon him by
outsiders, there were his own concerns. His personal affairs required
looking after, and he regulated accounts, an elaborate business always
with him, put his farms in order, corresponded with his merchants
in England, and introduced agricultural improvements, which always
interested him deeply.
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