Washington's reply, with his usual good sense, answers a good many
questions which are bruited to-day. Dr. Albert Shaw, in the _Review of
Reviews_, once brought some of these questions forward. "How far is it
right for the people of a free state to kill their magistrates by
inches?" This is the question reduced to its simplest terms. It was
generally understood, when the late Governor Greenhalge died in
Massachusetts, that his career, invaluable to the people of that State
and of the country, had been cut off untimely by a certain etiquette,
which obtains in Massachusetts, that whenever there is a public dinner
the Governor of the State must be present and make a speech. With
reference to a somewhat similar notion, Washington says:

Before the present custom was established I was unable to attend to
any business whatever. Gentlemen, consulting their own convenience
rather than mine, were calling from the time I rose from breakfast,
often before, until I sat down to dinner. To please everybody was
impossible. I therefore adopted that line of conduct which combined
public advantage with private convenience.

In another place he says:

Had I not adopted the principle of returning no visits, I should
have been unable to have attended to any sort of business.

In contrast with the simple ceremonies at which a sensitive democracy
took exception, we find now that a great nation considers no honors too
profuse for the ceremonies which attend the inauguration of its chief
magistrate.

FOOTNOTES: