The earliest known Washington coat of arms had blazoned upon it "3 Cinque
foiles," which was the herald's way of saying that the bearer was a
landholder and cultivator, and when Washington had a book-plate made for
himself he added to the conventional design of the arms spears of wheat
and other plants, as an indication of his favorite labor. During his
career he acted several parts, but in none did he find such pleasure as in
farming, and late in life he said, "I think with you, that the life of a
husbandman of all others is the most delectable. It is honorable, it is
amusing, and, with judicious management, it is profitable. To see plants
rise from the earth and flourish by the superior skill and bounty of the
laborer fills a contemplative mind with ideas which are more easy to be
conceived than expressed." "Agriculture has ever been the most favorite
amusement of my life," he wrote after the Revolution, and he informed
another correspondent that "the more I am acquainted with agricultural
affairs, the better pleased I am with them; insomuch, that I can no where
find so great satisfaction as in those innocent and useful pursuits: In
indulging these feelings, I am led to reflect how much more delightful to
an undebauched mind is the task of making improvements on the earth, than
all the vain glory which can be acquired from ravaging it, by the most
uninterrupted career of conquests." A visitor to Mount Vernon in 1785
states that his host's "greatest pride is, to be thought the first farmer
in America. He is quite a Cincinnatus."

Undoubtedly a part of this liking flowed from his strong affection for
Mount Vernon. Such was his feeling for the place that he never seems to
have been entirely happy away from it, and over and over again, during his
various and enforced absences, he "sighs" or "pants" for his "own vine and
fig tree." In writing to an English correspondent, he shows his feeling