where the great author himself marked them private or from parts
otherwise not necessary to go before the world. So guarded and prepared,
and with a commentary interwoven, Mrs. Lear left its publication to my
discretion. I returned the original letters, in number more than thirty,
in the state I received them from her. I never allowed any one of them
to be copied; but gave one away, or two, for I am not at this day
certain which, to Mr. Polk while he was President of the United States,
having first asked and obtained Mrs. Lear's consent for that purpose.
She also gave me two of them not very long before her decease, which I
prize the more as her gift. I have other original letters from the same
immortal source, the valued donation in 1830, of the son of Colonel
Lear, Lincoln Lear, Esquire.

This excellent lady, who long honored me with her friendship and
confidence in the above and other ways, after surviving Colonel Lear
forty years, died last December in Washington. There she had continued
to live as his widow; being all this time in possession of, and as I
supposed owning, these original letters. There she lived, beloved as a
pattern of the Christian virtues, and enjoying the esteem of the circle
around her as an interesting relict of days becoming historical; but
ever elevating in the associations they recall. Now that she is gone, I
am induced to give to the public the paper in question. In doing so I
have the best grounds for believing that I perform an act that would
have been grateful to her were she living. She was fully informed of my
intention to publish it and could not but be sensible that the long
respect and affectionate attachment of General Washington which her
husband enjoyed, as so indelibly stamped upon these letters, is a record
of his probity, capacity, and sterling worth, than which none could ever
be more precious, or be likely to endure longer. This consideration it
might be thought affects only the descendants of Colonel Lear or others