The reality of it all is increased by the bodily presence of Washington’s own kin, men and women bearing his name, the descendants of his collateral relatives. A little boat rocking at anchor off the wharf at Wakefield is the fishing dory of Lawrence Washington, commonly called “Lal” Washington by his neighbors. He is a man of substance and dignity. But he takes delight in fishing his own pound nets, and the unpretentious fishermen of the region tell how the old man’s enthusiasm was such that he rushed waist deep into the water to help three or four young fellows drag ashore a heavily laden seine. His brother was for years State’s Attorney of a neighboring county, and other members of the family are landholders in Westmoreland. Their neighbors accept these families of historic name in a simple, matter-of-fact fashion, and with no humiliating sense of inferiority. “They’re all smart people,” said the young fisherman that sailed us across Monroe Creek to the wharf at Wakefield, and that is what Westmoreland expects of the Washingtons. Neighboring plantations are stocked with fine old European nut and fruit trees, such as the colonists with the increasing wealth of the third and fourth generations were accustomed to import. In some places the fig is cultivated, and within the shadow of the birthplace monument is a dense colony of young fig shoots which have sprung and resprung after every severe winter for perhaps more than a century and a half. The steep bank of Bridges Creek to the southeast of the monument is lined with cherry trees that to this day bear excellent fruit, to be had merely for the picking. One gathers from all the surroundings of the place a strong sense of the dignity and simplicity that mark plantation life in Virginia. It is a quiet life, indeed, that the people of these Westmoreland plantations lead. Even to this day sailing craft slowly worm their way far into the deep navigable inlets of the region, and carry freight to Baltimore and Washington. Each plantation has its own wharf, and each planter keeps a lookout for the coming schooner, just as their ancestors of Washington’s day must have watched for the slow and patient craft that plied up and down the Potomac, and away to Baltimore, Philadelphia, and New York, or across the Atlantic to England, a voyage that might stretch out for six or eight, ten, or even twelve weeks.