He was, too, the most hospitable of men in the best sense, and his house was always open to all who came. When he was away during the war or the presidency, his instructions to his agents were to keep up the hospitality of Mount Vernon, just as if he had been there himself; and he was especially careful in directing that, if there were general distress, poor persons of the neighborhood should have help from his kitchen or his granaries. His own more immediate hospitality was of the same kind. He always entertained in the most liberal manner, both as general and President, and in a style which he thought befitted the station he occupied. But apart from all this, his table, whether at home or abroad, was never without its guest. "Dine with us," he wrote to Lear on July 31, 1797, "or we shall do what we have not done for twenty years, dine alone." The real hospitality which opens the door and spreads the board for the friend or stranger, admitting them to the family without form or ceremony, was his also. "My manner of living is plain," he wrote to a friend after the Revolution; "I do not mean to be put out of it. A glass of wine and a bit of mutton are always ready; and such as will be content to partake of them are always welcome. Those who expect more will be disappointed, but no change will be effected by it." Genuine hospitality as unstinted as it was sincere was not characteristic of a cold man, or of one who sought to avoid his fellows. It is one of the lighter graces of life, perhaps, but when it comes freely and simply, and not as a vehicle for the display or the aggrandizement of its dispenser, it is not without a meaning to the student of character.