It was in January, 1759, that Washington took his seat in the House, and if he made it his rule "to speak seldom but on important subjects," he had several opportunities to speak before he finally left the Virginia Legislature for a more important gathering. The first very important subject was the Stamp Act, in 1765. The British Government had passed an act requiring the American colonies to place a stamp upon every newspaper or almanac that was published, upon every marriage certificate, every will, every deed, and upon other legal papers. These stamps were to be sold by officers of the crown, and the money obtained by the sale was to be used to pay British soldiers stationed in America to enforce the laws made by Parliament. The colonies were aflame with indignation. They declared that Parliament had no right to pass such an act; that the Ministry that proposed it was about an unlawful business; and that it was adding insult to injury to send over soldiers to enforce such laws. People, when they meet on the corner of the street and discuss public matters, are usually much more outspoken than when they meet in legislatures; but the American colonists were wont to talk very plainly in their assemblies, and it was no new thing for the representatives, chosen by the people, to be at odds with the governor, who represented the British Government. So when Patrick Henry rose up in the House of Burgesses, with his resolutions declaring that the Stamp Act was illegal and that the colony of Virginia had always enjoyed the right of governing itself, as far as taxation went,--and when he made a flaming speech which threatened the King, there was great confusion; and though his resolutions were passed, there was but a bare majority. There is no record of what Washington may have said or how he voted on that occasion, but his letters show that he thought the Stamp Act a very unwise act on the part of Great Britain, and a piece of oppression. "That Act," he says, "could be looked upon in no other light by every person who would view it in its proper colors." But he did not rush into a passion over it. Instead, he studied it coolly, and before it was repealed, wrote at some length to his wife's uncle, who was living in London, his reasons for thinking that the British Ministry would gain nothing by pressing the Stamp Act and other laws which bore hard on colonial prosperity; for he held that if they would only see it, the colonies were as necessary to England as England to the colonies. [Illustration: PATRICK HENRY.]