1798 he told his chief overseer he did not choose to "discontinue my rides
or become a cipher on my own estate."

When at Mount Vernon, as this indicated, Washington rode daily about his
estate, and he has left a pleasant description of his life immediately
after retiring from the Presidency: "I begin my diurnal course with the
sun;... if my hirelings are not in their places at that time I send them
messages expressive of my sorrow for their indisposition;... having put
these wheels in motion, I examine the state of things further; and the
more they are probed, the deeper I find the wounds are which my buildings
have sustained by my absence and neglect of eight years; by the time
I have accomplished these matters, breakfast (a little after seven
o'clock)... is ready;... this being over, I mount my horse and ride round
my farms, which employs me until it is time to dress for dinner." A
visitor at this time is authority for the statement that the master "often
works with his men himself--strips off his coat and labors like a common
man. The General has a great turn for mechanics. It's astonishing with
what niceness he directs everything in the building way, condescending
even to measure the things himself, that all may be perfectly uniform."

This personal attention Washington was able to give only with very serious
interruptions. From 1754 till 1759 he was most of the time on the
frontier; for nearly nine years his Revolutionary service separated him
absolutely from his property; and during the two terms of his Presidency
he had only brief and infrequent visits. Just one-half of his forty-six
years' occupancy of Mount Vernon was given to public service.

The result was that in 1757 he wrote, "I am so little acquainted with the
business relative to my private affairs that I can scarce give you any
information concerning it," and this was hardly less true of the whole