while I only meant to give the world this new instance of your genius, I might have incurred the imputation of vanity.  This, and nothing else, determined me not to give it place in the public prints.

“If you should ever come to Cambridge, or near head-quarters, I
shall be happy to see a person so favored by the Muses, and to whom
Nature has been so liberal and beneficent in her dispensations.

“I am, with great respect, your obedient servant,
“GEORGE WASHINGTON. 
“Miss Phillis Wheatley.”

The tenor, style, and manner of President Washington’s letter to Miss Wheatley—­the publication of her works, together with an accompanying likeness of the author, and her inscription and dedication of the volume to the “Right Honorable the Countess of Huntingdon,” show, that she, though young, was a person of no ordinary mind, no common attainments; but at the time, one of the brightest ornaments among the American literati.  She also was well versed in Latin, in which language she composed several pieces.  Miss Wheatley died in 1780, at the age of 26 years, being seven years of age when brought to this country in 1761.

Doctor Peter, who married Miss Wheatley, 1775, was a man of business, tact, and talents—­being first a grocer, and afterwards studied law, which he practised with great success, becoming quite wealthy by defending the cause of the oppressed before the different tribunals of the country.  And who shone brighter in his day, than Benjamin Bannaker, of Baltimore county, Maryland, who by industry and force of character, became a distinguished mathematician and astronomer,—­“for many years,” says Davenport’s Biographical Dictionary, “calculated and published the Maryland Ephemerides.”  He was a correspondent of the Honorable Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of State of the United States, taking the earliest opportunity of his acquaintanceship, to call his attention to the evils of American slavery, and doubtless his acquaintance with the apostle of American Democracy, had much to do with his reflections on that most pernicious evil in this country.  Mr. Bannaker was also a naturalist, and wrote a treatise on locusts.  He was invited by the Commission of United States Civil Engineers, to assist in the survey of the Ten Miles Square, for the District of Columbia.  He assisted the Board, who, it is thought, could not have succeeded without him.  His Almanac was preferred to that of Leadbeater, or any other calculator cotemporary with himself.  He had no family, and resided in a house alone, but principally made his home with the Elliott family.  He was upright, honorable, and virtuous; entertaining religious scruples similar to the Friends.  He died in 1807, near Baltimore.  Honorable John H.B.  Latrobe, Esq., of Baltimore, is his biographer.

In 1812, Captain Paul Cuffy was an extensive trader and mariner, sailing out of Boston, to the West Indies and Europe, by which enterprise, he amassed an immense fortune.  He was known to the commercial world of his day, and, if not so wealthy, stood quite as fair, and as much respected, as Captain George Laws or Commodore Vanderbilt, the Cunards of America.  Captain Cuffy went to Africa, where he died in a few years.