Travels Through North America 



after making some necessary arrangements, and settling 

 his family affairs, to return to Virginia, and spend the re- 

 mainder of his life upon his vast and noble domain there. 

 I am not certain in what year this happened, or how long 

 Lord Fairfax remained in England. He was present at 

 his brother Robert's first marriage, which, according to 

 Mr. Hasted, [see Hist, of Kent, vol. II. page 478.] took 

 place in the year 1741; for he frequently mentioned the 

 fatigue he underwent in sitting up for a month together, 

 full dressed and in form to receive visits upon that occasion: 

 nor did he go back to Virginia before the year 1745, be- 

 cause, when he arrived there, Mr. William Fairfax had 

 removed out of Westmoreland into Fairfax county, to a beau- 

 tiful house which he had built upon the banks of the Potow- 

 mac, a little below Mount Vernon, called Belvoir; which he 

 did not do previous to that time. In all probability there- 

 fore, Lord Fairfax first went to America about the year 

 1739, returned to England the year following, and finally 

 settled in the Northern Neck in 1746, or 1747. On his re- 

 turn he went to Belvoir, the seat of his friend and relation 

 Mr. William Fairfax, and remained several years in his 

 family, undertaking and directing the management of his 

 farms and plantations, and amusing himself with hunting, 

 and the pleasures of the field. At length, the lands about 

 Belvoir not answering his expectation, and the foxes be- 

 coming less numerous, he determined to remove to a fine 

 tract of land on the western side of the Blue Ridge, or Apa- 

 lachian mountains, in Frederic county, about eighty miles 

 from Belvoir; where he built a small neat house, which he 

 called Greenway Court; and laid out one of the most beau- 

 tiful farms, consisting of arable and grazing lands, and of 



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