matter, deposed that his wife had done this without his sanction and approval, and that the negro had invited persons to 'drink before the election without the wife's sanction and approval, it having been her purpose to invite all, whether his friends or opponents, to freely partake after the polls had been closed. The Committee on Elections of the House of Burgesses reported that the Burgess was excused, and he was not expelled from the House. In the same year, however, two worthy representatives, John Chiswell and John Syme, elected from the county of Hanover, were expelled from the House because they had treated voters throughout the county in their effort to secure their election. Again, in 1775, we find the charge of procuring votes by treating brought against Henry · Lee, of Prince William. He acknowledged the same and was expelled. The charge was brought against a delegate from Elizabeth City county, but he was excused. In 1756 George Washington was elected a member of the House of Burgesses from the county of Frederick. The previous year he had stood for election and had been defeated through the influence of a tavern keeper. At the time of the second election he was not present in the county, but Colonel James Wood, then clerk, acted as his representative and agent. After the election he presented to Mr. Washington a bill for £39, 6s., expenses for the election. Some of the items were a hogshead and a barrel of punch, thirty-five gallons of strong cider, and dinner for those who voted for Washington. About this same time a very strenuous law was passed against treating at elections. Doubtless Mr. Washington felt that he had been guilty of a very serious offense; anyhow, we never again hear of any such accusation against Washington himself.

There were many other contested cases in which the charge of treating was the main point involved. The contested election of Danridge vs. Littlepage, in 1764, in which Patrick

Henry was counsel for the plaintiff, was a similar case. An interesting case also was the case of Nash vs. Marable, in which it was shown that Marable had paid men to conduct all men who voted for him to a bar, where all the voters were treated at Marable's expense. He was expelled from the House and Nash was seated in his stead. To treat became so common that the very best men in the colony had to indulge in it in order to be elected. We are told that James Madison failed to be elected in the House of Delegates in 1777 because he refused to treat. There was a strong opposition to this method of procedure, and many of the best people in the State, about the time of the Revolution, tried earnestly to break it up. An interesting petition, begging the Legislature to pass a severe law which would forbid treating, is preserved by Bishop Meade in his "Old Churches and Families of Virginia.' The petition was signed by Edward Pendleton and many others. The newspapers also begged the citizens to vote for the best men, and not to be influenced in any way by the hospitality which might be extended by some of the candidates. Nevertheless we know that for a long time the custom continued to exist in Virginia-practically as long as the courthouses were the centres at which the elections were heldthe successful candidates, after the election was over, remaining at the courthouses for several days, treating their friends promiscuously.

We are, therefore, justified in concluding that so far as elections were concerned in Virginia, whether the electors were freeholders, housekeepers, or ordinary freemen, the question has always been raised as to whether the elections were fairly conducted and were free from corruption. We are probably safe in assuming that colonial politics were somewhat tainted, and that family influence and bribery were not altogether absent. Even with restricted suffrage and with the elections

held under the viva voce system and at infrequent intervals, there were frequent disturbances at the polls, resulting in fisticuffs or a duel, followed by much drinking and treating after the election, not to mention what was done immediately before the election by the friends and agents of the candidates. Inside the legislative body there were always rings, chiefly considering the personal interest of some individual as opposed to the interest of the entire colony. The one redeeming feature was that when the politicians came to deal with the broad questions which affected the relation of the colony to the mother country or the governmental powers exercised by the Governor as a royal representative, a majority of the Burgesses took a high position for liberty, an attitude which resulted in the rejecting by Virginia and the people of America of kingly government, of privileged orders or institutions savoring of nobility, of the primogeniture and entailed systems, and of an established church. Thus out of the chaotic conditions and conflicting factions has been realized a republican form of government.

CHAPTER XX.

THE COLONIAL GENTLEMAN.

The question as to how far the society of the Virginia Colony was affected by the presence of so large a poor and serving class has been passed upon in previous chapters, the conclusion being that to no appreciable extent was any impression made by this class of people. Many of these, to be sure, came to places of usefulness and respectability, but only a few of them achieved any social or political distinction.

The Virginia colonial gentleman was very much the same sort of a man as he was on the Hudson or in New England. Mr. Thacker, in his "Recollections of Old Plantation Life," describing the visitors to his father's home, says:

"Among them were jolly old Virginia gentlemen, eccentric old Virginia gentlemen, prosy old Virginia gentlemen, courtly old Virginia gentlemen, plain-mannered old Virginia gentlemen, charming old Virginia gentlemen and uninteresting old Virginia gentlemen, many of them graduates of William and Mary College."

It is to be observed that, however differently endowed these visitors were, all of them seemed entitled to the name of gentlemen. Doubtless these were in line of true succession to the first gentlemen of the colony.

There can be no doubt but that there was such a class of men in the colony who were entitled to the name of gentlemen as a social distinction. This does not mean necessarily that they were of noble lineage or that they always carried

themselves in appreciation of the fact that they were gentlemen, but it does mean that there was in the heterogeneous scciety of the colony men of such ancestry, influence and culture as separated them from other classes, and to whom was accorded the name of gentlemen. Why there should be any disposition to offer any contention about this fact seems. hard to understand. There does not seem to be any desire on the part of any one to claim any more for the Virginia gentleman than for other gentlemen of other colonies or of other days. There is, however, to be discovered in certain literature an insistence more or less pronounced that the Virginia gentleman is not entitled to all that has been claimed for him. The truth is that in some quarters the Virginia gentleman seems to be hard to account for. Just how, under colonial conditions, there could have existed such a personage, creates a demand on the part of some for philosophic explanation. The fact remains, however, that there was indeed such a personage as the Virginia gentleman, a historical entity in the annals of colonial Virginia.

One of the things that seems difficult to account for in the Virginia gentleman is that in many instances he was really a cultivated man, and of him is frequently asked the astonishing question, "Whence knoweth this man letters?" Mr. Gordon McCabe evidently had this in mind when he

wrote:

"The product was here, for the number of educated Virginians was large as compared with such persons in other colonies, but the machinery appeared to be wanting. And in a country peopled with men of high culture (for that time), where there was great political knowledge and experience, the educational function can hardly be traced. The fact remains, however, that the list of the Revolutionary leaders in Congress and State politics, from 1765 to 1799, would be very