It was out of sight in a few minutes, and in a few minutes more it was out of hearing; but in that time George, who was quick-witted, had shrewdly guessed the name and rank of the gentleman with the plain clothes and the diamond-hilted sword. It was the great Earl of Fairfax--the soldier, the wit, the rich nobleman--who for some mysterious reason had chosen to come to this new land, and to build a lodge in the wilderness. The boy had often heard his mother, Madam Washington, speak of Earl Fairfax. Meeting with him was one of the events of that great journey she had made in her girlhood to England, where for a time she lived in the house of her brother Joseph Ball, at Cookham, in Berkshire, who had left his Virginia home and had taken up his residence in England. Here Mary Ball had met Augustine Washington, then in England upon affairs connected with his property. Augustine Washington was one of the handsomest men of his day, and from him his eldest son George inherited the noble air and figure that marked him. Mary Ball was a Virginia beauty, and although admired by many Englishmen of distinction, she rather chose to marry Augustine Washington, albeit he had been married before, and had two motherless boys. In England, therefore, were they married, sailing soon after for Virginia, and within twelve years Mrs. Washington was a widow with five children. She loved to talk to her children of those happy English days, when she had first pledged herself to Augustine Washington. It had also been the only time of excitement in her quiet life, and she had met many of the wits and cavaliers and belles of the reign of George the Second. She sometimes spoke of Lord Fairfax, but always guardedly; and George had conceived the idea that his mother perhaps knew Lord Fairfax better, and the reasons for his abandonment of his own country, than she cared to tell.