The twenty-year-old George Washington visited his father's estate, strolling through the orchard. He spied a women standing near the skeleton of the cherry tree he killed fourteen years before. Eleanor Bradford had the full bosom and flared hips of a woman of eighteen and a half summers, not the child he had last seen. As she walked to a tree in full bloom and sniffed the pink flowers, her beauty and grace struck him.
George walked toward her, words forming in his mind to tell her of his affections toward her. His words swayed her, and they retired to a hidden area between trees. Kissing and touching led to an impassioned shriek that echoed across the woods, followed by an ecstatic groan. Clothing perfectly replaced, she returned to her home, and George returned to his father's.
"George," said his father, "I was just out on the grounds, when I heard a mighty climax. I saw Eleanor leaving the orchard. Do you know what has happened yonder in the garden?"
"I cannot tell a lie, Father, you know I cannot tell a lie! I did take her cherry with my 'little hatchet'," George replied.
Originally published February 2008