(See Life of John
Adams, iii. 35.)]
He had, too, a fierce temper, and although he gradually subdued it, he
would sometimes lose control of himself and burst out into a tempest
of rage. When he did so he would use strong and even violent language,
as he did at Kip's Landing and at Monmouth. Well-intentioned persons
in their desire to make him a faultless being have argued at great
length that Washington never swore, and but for their argument the
matter would never have attracted much attention. He was anything but
a profane man, but the evidence is beyond question that if deeply
angered he would use a hearty English oath; and not seldom the action
accompanied the word, as when he rode among the fleeing soldiers at
Kip's Landing, striking them with his sword, and almost beside himself
at their cowardice. Judge Marshall used to tell also of an occasion
when Washington sent out an officer to cross a river and bring back
some information about the enemy, on which the action of the morrow
would depend. The officer was gone some time, came back, and found
the general impatiently pacing his tent. On being asked what he had
learned, he replied that the night was dark and stormy, the river full
of ice, and that he had not been able to cross. Washington glared at
him a moment, seized a large leaden inkstand from the table, hurled it
at the offender's head, and said with a fierce oath, "Be off, and send
me a _man_!" The officer went, crossed the river, and brought back the
information.
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