THE PRESIDENT AND HIS LAST VISIT TO HIS MOTHER
Once more, and once only, do we hear of Mary Washington in connection with her son. We read that her home filled her time and heart; that she, like her son, sowed and planted, arranging her garden as the seasons succeeded each other, delighting in her personal work therein. Who can measure the charm, to a woman, of even a small garden! How often has she not "heard the voice of the Lord walking in the garden in the cool of the day!" She was born in a garden. Her first perception of beauty was awakened by her flowers. With these for companionship, who can be utterly wretched? Not all unhappy was the prisoner, after his "Picciola" had cleft the stone masonry of his dungeon!
We love to think of Mary Washington in the old garden! Nowhere so sweetly, so gently, can a wearied body fulfil its day, until God wills the release of the soul.
On the 14th of April, 1789, Washington received at Mount Vernon official intelligence that he had been chosen President of the United States. He at once prepared to go to New York and enter upon the duties of his office, but before doing so he set out on the evening of the same day, mounted on his horse and attended by his favorite body-servant, Billy Lee, to visit his mother in Fredericksburg. He found her feeble in body but bright-minded and cheerful, and he informed her that he had been elected President, and had come to bid her an affectionate farewell before assuming his office. "So soon," he said, "as the public business which must necessarily be encountered in arranging a new government can be disposed of, I shall hasten to Virginia"—but here she interrupted him and said: "You will see me no more. Age and disease warn me that I shall not be long in this world. I trust in God I am somewhat prepared for a better. But go; fulfil the high destinies which Heaven appears to assign you; go, and may Heaven's and your mother's blessing be with you always." This was the last meeting between the mother and the son.
But that her heart followed him through the marvellous events of the next few weeks none can doubt. They helped her to ignore the shadow hanging over her. She was cheerful, strong, and uncomplaining.
She decided to make two visits,—one to the family of Charles and the other to the widow and orphan children of Samuel Washington. The families met together to talk gratefully and affectionately of the illustrious one whom the country was loading with honors. He had left Mount Vernon on the 16th of April. An entry in his diary records his feelings. "I bade adieu to Mount Vernon and domestic felicity and with a mind oppressed with more anxious and painful sensations than I can express, set out for New York with the best disposition to render service to my country in obedience to its call, but with less hope of answering its expectations."
To his friend, General Knox, he wrote: "Integrity and firmness are all I can promise. These, be my voyage long or short, shall never forsake me, although I may be deserted by all men; for of the consolations which are to be derived from these under any circumstances, the world cannot deprive me."
This was the spirit in which he met the extraordinary honors which awaited him. "His progress to the seat of government was a continual ovation. The ringing of bells and roaring of cannonry proclaimed his course through the country. The old and young, women and children, thronged the highways to welcome him." Governors met him at the frontiers of their respective states. Cavalry assembled to escort him. The throngs gathered as he advanced until a mighty host followed him. Arches of flowers and evergreens, and triumphal arches of laurel, spanned the paths he travelled. When he reached the banks of the Delaware he must have recalled that midnight passage over the ice-bound river at Christmas,—a representation of which hangs in almost every humble hostelry in the country. How different his feelings then and now! Over the stream which flows through Trenton a bridge was decked with laurel, with the inscription, "The Defenders of the Mothers will be the Protectors of the Daughters." The matrons were there; and the young girls, crowned with garlands, strewed his way with flowers, singing of their love and gratitude. No king on his way to coronation ever received such a heartfelt ovation!
Washington's Reception at Trenton.
And so—on and on—until at Elizabeth Point he entered the barge with white satin canopy, which was to bring him to New York. Parties of ladies and gentlemen followed the barge singing pæans of welcome. In his diary that night he records, "The display of boats, the songs, the instrumental music, the decorations of the ships, the roar of cannon, the loud acclamations filled my mind with sensations as painful (considering the reverse of this scene which may be the case after all my labors to do good) as they are pleasing."
For, after all, he was a sad man. He had surrendered his soldier's dream of home and peace. He had parted with his aged mother, and knew that he could not minister to her in her last few months of life. He was too great a man to permit such things as these—applause, laurel, songs, salvos of artillery—to fill his heart or even his imagination with pleasure.
She heard it all! Doubtless her mental commentary was her old refrain: "This is too much praise! George has only done his duty."
The world still shares—still marvels at—the worship of Washington then and now. As Lecky says, "He entered the scene as only a conspicuous member of the planter aristocracy, his mind not quick or original, no brilliancy of wit, entirely without the gift of eloquence, with few accomplishments, no language except his own, nothing to dazzle or overpower." Moreover, he had not a university training at home or abroad, and no foreign travel to enlarge his vision. His was the splendid triumph of character—character inherited and fostered in the formative years of his life by a faithful mother. No one can read the just eulogy of the accomplished nineteenth-century English writer, without perceiving the close resemblance—in temperament and character—between the two.
"Those who knew him noticed that he had keen sensibilities and strong passions; but his power of self-command never failed him, and no act of his life can be traced to personal caprice, ambition or resentment. In the despondency of long-continued failure, in the elation of sudden success, at times when the soldiers were deserting by hundreds and malignant plots were formed against his reputation, amid the constant quarrels, rivalries and jealousies of his subordinates, in the dark hour of national ingratitude and in the midst of the most intoxicating flattery, he was always the same calm, wise, just and single-minded man, pursuing the cause which he believed to be right without fear or favour or fanaticism."
In short, he triumphed over all through the strength of a character, firm as a rock, which no storm could shake or dislodge. The English writer himself marvels at the unchallenged worship of the world, and he thus explains it. "He was in the highest sense a gentleman and a man of honour. It was always known by his friends, and it was soon acknowledged by the nation and by the English themselves, that in Washington, America had found a leader who could be induced by no earthly motive to tell a falsehood or to break an engagement or to commit a dishonourable act."
Whatever may be the deep, underlying cause of the idolatry of the American people, it certainly inspires all classes of men. He is the star to which all eyes gratefully turn—the wise and unlettered, rich and poor. Other heroes are, and deserve to be, admitted into their hearts: but they jealously hold for him the chiefest, holiest place.
"See here, do you expect to get to heaven?" was asked of a peculiarly profane lad—a "hard case"—who indignantly answered: "Course I do! Don't you suppose I want to see General Washington?"