Life among the Planters--The Dismal Swamp--The peace of Fontainebleau--Arrogance of the British--The Stamp Act--Speech of Patrick Henry--The First Congress--Testimony of Franklin--Views of Washington--Splendor of Display--Insolence of the Soldiery--The Boston Massacre--The Expedition to the Ohio--Events of the Journey--The Romance of Travel in the Wilderness. Many of the Virginia planters were devoted to pleasure alone. They lived high, gambled, hunted, and left the management of their estates very much to overseers. Washington was a model planter. He carried into the administration of his estate all the sagacity, integrity, punctuality, and industry, which had thus far characterized him in public affairs. He was his own book-keeper, and his accounts were kept with methodical exactness. His integrity was such, that it is said that any barrel of flour, which bore his brand, was exempted in the West India ports from the ordinary inspection.[57] He was very simple in his domestic habits, rising often, in midwinter, at five o’clock. He kindled his own fire, and read or wrote, by candle-light, until seven o’clock when he breakfasted very frugally. His ordinary breakfast was two small cups of tea, and three or four cakes of Indian meal, called hoe-cakes. After breakfast he mounted one of his superb horses, and in simple attire, but which set off to great advantage his majestic frame, visited all those parts of the extended estate, where any work was in progress. Everything was subjected to his careful supervision. At times he dismounted, and even lent a helping hand in furtherance of the operations which were going on. He dined at two o’clock, and retired to his chamber about nine in the evening.[58] He was kind in word and deed to his negro slaves, and while careful that they should not be overtasked, was equally careful that they should not be permitted to loiter away their time in idleness. The servants were proud of their stately, dignified, wealthy master, and looked up to him with reverence amounting almost to religious homage. Washington was very fond of the chase. Often, when riding to a distant part of the estate, he would take some of the hounds with him, from the hope that he might start up a fox. There was not perhaps, in all Virginia, a better horseman, or a more bold rider. The habits and tastes of the old English nobility and gentry prevailed in Virginia to an extraordinary degree. The passion for following the hounds was thoroughly transplanted from the broad estates of the English land-holders to the vast realms which nature had reared and embellished on the banks of the Potomac, and amid the ridges of the Alleghanies.