Fueled by the apprehensions of smaller states, the amity celebrated by Washington in early June had crumbled by the end of the month. On June 30, the weather having grown sweltering, Gunning Bedford of Delaware delivered a hot-tempered tirade, aimed at the larger states, demonstrating just how bruising the discourse had become. “I do not, gentlemen, trust you,” he told them. He even hinted at secession, saying apropos of the smaller states that “sooner than be ruined, there are foreign powers who will take us by the hand.”² Washington and Madison gazed in dismay as their worst fears of disunion threatened to materialize before their eyes. In early July a disappointed Alexander Hamilton returned temporarily to New York on business and dropped a pessimistic note to Washington, saying how “seriously and deeply distressed” he was by the convention’s divisive sniping: “I fear that we shall let slip the golden opportunity of rescuing the American empire from disunion, anarchy, and misery.”³ Hostile to new federal powers, the two other New York delegates, Robert Yates and John Lansing, Jr., left the convention by July 5, never to return.

Although he held his tongue during the debates, Washington was never a neutral party, and the interminable squabbling only reinforced his view that the country needed a potent central government to override the selfish ambitions of local politicians. The man associated with so many triumphs shuddered at the prospect of being associated with public failure. “I almost despair of seeing a favorable issue to . . . the convention and do therefore repent having had any agency in the business,” he informed Hamilton on July 10, chastising “narrow-minded politicians . . . under the influence of local views.”⁴ In a gentle, almost fatherly way, he begged Hamilton, the prodigal son, to return to the fold. “I am sorry you went away,” he said. “I wish you were back. The crisis is equally important and alarming and no opposition under such circumstances should discourage exertions till the signature is fixed.”⁵

While the convention dragged on, Washington drank enormous quantities of tea at the City Tavern and the Indian Queen, two haunts frequented by delegates. In his social life, he exhibited expert political instincts and embraced a wide spectrum of citizens, as if he already saw the presidency looming dimly on the horizon. On one of his first Sundays, he attended a Roman Catholic mass and also dined with Mark Prager, Sr., a Jewish merchant. On several occasions he joined fraternal dinners hosted by the Irish American Sons of St. Patrick. In early June he yielded to the importunate General Mifflin and reviewed the infantry, cavalry, and artillery of Philadelphia, as if he were already more than merely president of the convention.

Washington’s Philadelphia itineraries reflected his far-ranging interests. Surgeon Abraham Chovet gave him a private tour of his Anatomical Museum, with its ingenious displays of human figures. Washington also gratified his abiding love of theater by catching plays at the Southwark Theater, which lay beyond Philadelphia’s borders because of a law banning theater performances in the city proper. He evinced continuing solicitude for artists, sitting for an engraving by Charles Willson Peale and a portrait by Robert Edge Pine, who needed to touch up work begun at Mount Vernon two years earlier. In his wanderings, he visited a gristmill on the Schuylkill River and exhausted the proprietor with questions. “This day, Gen. Washington, Gen. Mifflin and four others of the convention did us the honor of paying us a visit in order to see our vineyard and bee houses,” said Peter Legaux, a French immigrant. “In this they found great delight, asked a number of questions, and testified their highest approbation with my manner of managing bees.”⁶ At Franklin’s house, Washington revealed a sharp interest in mechanical inventions, marveling at a mangle used for pressing items after they were washed.

As always, Washington’s silences were as eloquent at his pronouncements. In late July he accompanied Robert Morris on a trout-fishing expedition to a creek near Valley Forge, prompting him to ride over to his old army cantonment. In his diary, Washington mentioned having “visited all the works, which were in ruins, and the encampments in woods, where the ground had not been cultivated.”⁷ When he last saw Valley Forge, it had been cold and gloomy, bare of all foliage. Now it was a balmy place, lush with summer greenery. The sight undoubtedly stirred deep-seated memories in Washington, but his diary entry for that day is curiously reticent; even by Washingtonian standards, it is a gem of emotional evasion. After a one-sentence allusion to Valley Forge, he continued, “On my return back to Mrs. Moore’s, observing some farmers at work and entering into conversation with them, I received the following information with respect to the mode of cultivating buckwheat and the application of the grain.”⁸ He then listed various ways to sow, plow, and harrow buckwheat, as if that were the day’s major occurrence. On some level, Washington felt the powerful lure of the past yet could never articulate it. He proved only a touch more expansive after visiting the site of the Germantown battle, stating that he had “contemplated on the dangers which threatened the American Army at that place.”⁹ That was his total commentary. Active and forward-looking, Washington did not amble very often down memory lane, though some dinner guests at Mount Vernon recalled him reminiscing about the war.

In the absence of Martha’s company, Washington continued to gravitate toward alluring female society. When he dined at a club composed of the city’s leading gentlemen, he noted that they invited female family members on alternate Saturdays. Not surprisingly, Washington chose that day to attend, specifying, “This was the ladies day.”¹⁰ Several times he called upon Elizabeth Powel and dusted off a musty streak of gallantry. As he wrote to her on July 23, “Gen[era]l Washington presents his respectful compliments to Mrs. Powel and will do himself the honor of calling upon her at or before 5 o’clock (in his carriage) in hopes of the pleasure of conducting her to Lansdown this evening.”¹¹ From the chivalrous tone of these messages, one senses that Washington could sometimes enjoy flirtatious banter. A week later, noting his trout-fishing trip to the Valley Forge area, he declined an invitation to escort Mrs. Powel to a performance of Sheridan’s School for Scandal: “The Gen[era] l can but regret that matters have turned out so unluckily after waiting so long to receive a lesson in the School for Scandal.”¹² Washington seldom allowed himself the liberty of jesting with a married lady in this manner. His lighthearted tone with Elizabeth Powel makes one wonder anew about the role of repressed sexuality in George Washington’s life. We have no evidence that he ever talked to Martha in this coy manner, nor is it easy to imagine. For all the happiness of their marriage, Martha had become his life’s standard prose while Elizabeth Powel, like Sally Fairfax, may have introduced some forbidden spice of poetry. It was as if, during his extended sojourn in Philadelphia, the footloose Washington permitted himself to explore sides of his personality that he kept firmly under wraps at home.

NOT LONG AFTER Washington wrote so gloomily to Hamilton, the Constitutional Convention experienced a spectacular breakthrough. In mid-July it was agreed that the small states would be represented equally in the Senate, while the House would have proportional representation based on population. For Washington and other Virginia delegates, it was a bitter pill to swallow, threatening to weaken the federal government critically. Nonetheless, an eminently pragmatic man, Washington accepted the need for painful compromises to form a union, assuring Henry Knox that the government being shaped by the delegates was “the best that can be obtained at the present moment, under such diversity of ideas as prevail.”¹³