n once more writes
to him: "I hold myself infinitely obliged to the legislature for the
ready attention which they have paid to my representation of the wants
of the army, and to you for the strenuous manner in which you have
recommended to the people an observance of my request."[310] Finally,
if any men had even better opportunities than Washington for
estimating correctly Governor Henry's efficiency in his great office,
surely those men were his intimate associates, the members of the
Virginia legislature. It is quite possible that their first election
of him as governor may have been in ignorance of his real qualities as
an executive officer; but this cannot be said of their second and of
their third elections of him, each one of which was made, as we have
seen, without one audible lisp of opposition. Is it to be believed
that, if he had really shown that lack of executive efficiency which
St. George Tucker's sneer implies, such a body of men, in such a
crisis of public danger, would have twice and thrice elected him to
the highest executive office in the State, and that, too, without one
dissenting vote? To say so, indeed, is to fix a far more damning
censure upon them than upon him.

FOOTNOTES:

[293] Clark's _Campaign in the Illinois_, 95-97, where Governor
Henry's public and private instructions are given in full.

[294] MS.

[295] _Jour. Va. House Del._ 30, 36, 66; also Hening, ix. 474-476;
477-478; 530-532; 584-585.

[296] MS.

[297] Sparks, _Corr. Rev_. ii. 261-262.

[298] MS.

[299] MS.

[300] Burk, _Hist. Va._ iv. 338.

[301] MS.

[302] Burk, _Hist. Va._ iv. 350.

[303] Wirt, 225.

[304] _Jour. Va. House Del._ 29.

[305] Burk, _Hist. Va._ 350.

[306] _Jour. Va. House Del._ 32.

[307] _Bland Papers_, ii. 11.

[308] MS.

[309] MS.

[310] MS.

CHAPTER XVI

AT HOME AND IN THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES

The high official rank which Governor Henry had borne during the first
three years of American independence was so impressive to the
imaginations of the French allies who were then in the country, that
some of them addressed their letters to him as "Son Altesse Royale,
Monsieur Patrick Henri, Gouverneur de l'Etat de Virginie."[311] From
this titular royalty he descended, as we have seen, about the 1st of
June, 1779; and for the subsequent five and a half years, until his
recall to the governorship, he is to be viewed by us as a very retired
country gentleman in delicate healt