"The unfreezing of Washington was begun by Irving, but was in that day a
venture so new and startling, that Irving, gentleman and scholar, went
at it gingerly and with many inferential deprecations. His hand,
however, first broke the ice, and to-day we can see the live and human
Washington, full length. He does not lose an inch by it, and we gain a
progenitor of flesh and blood."

Since Irving the thawing process has been carried on with growing
success by such able biographers as Lodge and Scudder, Hapgood and Ford,
Woodrow Wilson, Owen Wister, and Frederick Trevor Hill.

As yet this new idea of Washington's essential humanity has seemed too
novel and startling to make its way deep into the popular conviction. I
say "new idea." In reality it is a very old idea; only it has been
smothered by the partisan writers of history and biography. Certainly
the accounts of the first celebrations of Washington's Birthday do not
sound as though our ancestors were trying to work up their enthusiasm
over a steel-engraving hero.

"It was the most natural thing," writes Walsh,[3] "for our forefathers
to choose Washington's Birthday as a time for general thanksgiving and
rejoicing, and it is interesting to note that the observance was not
delayed until after the death of Washington. Washington had the
satisfaction of receiving the congratulations of his fellow-citizens
many times upon the return of his birthday, frequently being a guest at
the banquets given in honor of the occasion. In fact, after the
Revolution, Washington's Birthday practically took the place of the
birthday of the various crowned heads of Great Britain, which had always
been celebrated with enthusiasm during colonial times. When independence