"The Mimic Court at Williamsburg was exerting all its powers to please, but the patriots were not to be turned aside." They could draw the velvet glove over the gauntlet to pleasure a lady, but the gauntlet was there, nevertheless, and the gauntlet was of steel. We are impressed in reading of all this, with the punctilious etiquette of Williamsburg society which forbade the intrusion of politics into the social life. Lord Dunmore had been regarded with suspicion and distrust from the moment of his arrival in 1772. He was perfectly aware of the feeling of the First Assembly which met under his administration. Colonel Washington was a member of that assembly, and had been present--and active--at the consultations on public affairs held in the old Raleigh tavern. Yet, but for the death of Miss Custis, he would have been Dunmore's companion when he journeyed to Western Virginia to purchase land. He dined with Lord Dunmore a few days before the couriers brought news of the Act of Parliament closing the port at Boston. Nobody was more resolute than he in denunciation of that act, and in support of the resolutions of "sympathy for our distressed fellow-subjects of Boston." At that moment his pocket held an accepted invitation to dine with the governor. He did so dine, spent the evening with him, probably the night, too, for he breakfasted with him the next day at his farm. Two of Lord Dunmore's sons were students at William and Mary College. To all outward appearance everything was going well and smoothly among good friends and neighbors. [Illustration: Robert Carter of Nomini Hall.] The fast was appointed for the first day of June, 1774. The port was to be closed on the fourth. On that day Washington wrote in his diary, "Fasted all day and went to Church." George Mason, of "Gunston Hall," in the Northern Neck wrote home, "Please tell my dear little family that I desire my three eldest sons and my two eldest daughters may attend church in mourning." His friend and neighbor, Robert Carter, ordered differently. "No one must go from hence to church or observe this fast at all." Not yet were all the colonists prepared to follow Washington, Jefferson, Henry, Mason, and Lee in defiance to the British Crown! The fast was generally observed. The governor, it appears, had no power to prevent it. The time had not yet come when Virginia patriots, to avoid his interference, must hold their conferences in old St. John's Church at Richmond. At Williamsburg a sermon was preached from the text, "Help, Lord! for the godly man ceaseth, for the faithful fail from among the children of men." The tea was sealed up and destroyed, and money and provisions ordered to be sent to Boston. The counties were canvassed for these, and they were immediately forwarded.