George Washington's Last Duel by Thomas Nelson Page

Of all the places in the county "The Towers" was the favorite with the / young people. There even before Margaret was installed the Major kept / open house with his major domo and factotum "George Washington"; and / when Margaret came from school, of course it was popular. Only one class / of persons was excluded.

There were few people in the county who did not know of the Major's / antipathy to "old women," as he called them. Years no more entered into / his definition of this class than celibacy did into his idea of an "old / bachelor. " The state of single blessedness continued in the female / sex beyond the bloom of youth was in his eyes the sole basis of / this unpardonable condition. He made certain concessions to the few / individuals among his neighbors who had remained in the state of / spinsterhood, because, as he declared, neighborliness was a greater / virtue than consistency; but he drew the line at these few, and it was / his boast that no old woman had ever been able to get into his Eden. / "One of them," he used to say, "would close paradise just as readily now / as Eve did six thousand years ago. " Thus, although as Margaret grew / up she had any other friends she desired to visit her as often as she / chose, her wish being the supreme law at Rock Towers, she had never even / thought of inviting one of the class against whom her uncle's ruddy face / was so steadfastly set. The first time it ever occurred to her to invite / any one among the proscribed was when she asked Rose Endicott to pay / her a visit. Rose, she knew, was living with her old aunt, Miss Jemima / Bridges, whom she had once met in R -- -- -, and she had some apprehension / that in Miss Jemima's opinion, the condition of the South was so much / like that of the Sandwich Islands that the old lady would not permit / Rose to come without her personal escort. Accordingly, one evening after / tea, when the Major was in a particularly gracious humor, and had told / her several of his oldest and best stories, Margaret fell upon him / unawares, and before he had recovered from the shock of the encounter, / had captured his consent.