At Wilmington, in North Carolina, he was received by a military and civic escort, entertained at a public dinner, and attended a ball given in his honor in the evening. At Newbern he received like homage, where the dinner and the ball were given at the palace built by Governor Tryon about twenty-five years before. On the morning of the second of May he breakfasted at the country-seat of Governor Pinckney, a few miles from Charleston; and when he arrived at Haddrell's point, across the mouth of the Cooper river, he was met by General Pinckney, Edward Rutledge, and the recorder of the city, in a twelve-oared barge, rowed by twelve captains of American vessels, elegantly dressed. This was accompanied by a great number of other boats with gentlemen and ladies in them; and the gay scene, as the flotilla proceeded toward the city, was enlivened by vocal and instrumental music. At the wharf he was met by the governor and other civil officers, amid the thunder of artillery; and by the Cincinnati and a civic and military escort he was conducted to his lodgings.
Washington remained in Charleston a week, and then departed for Savannah. There he was greeted by General Wayne, General M'Intosh, and other companions-in-arms, and remained several days. He left for Augusta on the fifteenth, dined at Mulberry grove (the seat of Mrs. General Greene) that day, and reached Augusta on the eighteenth. There Governor Telfair, Judge Walton, and others, led in offering ceremonial honors to the illustrious guest.
On the twenty-first the president turned his face homeward, travelling by way of Columbia and Camden in South Carolina, Charlotte, Salisbury, Salem, Guilford and Hillsborough in North Carolina, and Harrisburg, Williamsburg, and Frederickburg, to Mount Vernon. At Salem, a Moravian settlement, he halted for the purpose of seeing Governor Martin, who, he was informed, was on his way to meet the president. He spent a day there, visiting the social and industrial establishments of the community, and attended their religious services in the evening. A committee in behalf of the community presented an address to him, to which he made a brief reply.[33] He reached home on the twelfth of June, having made a most satisfactory journey of more than seventeen hundred miles, after starting from Mount Vernon, in sixty-six days, with the same team of horses. “My return to this place is sooner than I expected,” he wrote to Hamilton, “owing to the uninterruptedness of my journey by sickness, from bad weather, or accidents of any kind whatsoever,” for which he had made an allowance of eight days.
Washington returned to Philadelphia on the sixth of July. “I am much pleased,” he wrote to Colonel Humphreys, then in Paris, on the twentieth, “that I have undertaken the journey, as it has enabled me to see with my own eyes the situation of the country through which we travelled, and to learn more accurately the disposition of the people than I could from any information.” His observations filled his mind with joy in contemplating the future. “The country appears,” he said, “to be in a very improving state, and industry and frugality are becoming much more fashionable than they have hitherto been. Tranquillity reigns among the people, with that disposition towards the general government which is likely to preserve it. They begin to feel the good effects of equal laws and equal protection. The farmer finds a ready market for his produce, and the merchant calculates with more certainty on his payments. Manufactures have as yet made but little progress in that part of the country, and it will probably be a long time before they are brought to that state to which they have already arrived in the middle and eastern parts of the Union. Each day's experience of the government of the United States seems to confirm its establishment, and to make it more popular. A ready acquiescence in the laws made under it shows in a strong light the confidence which the people have in their representatives, and in the upright views of those who administer the government.”
“Our public credit stands on that ground which, three years ago, it would have been a species of madness to have foretold. The astonishing rapidity with which the newly-instituted bank was filled gives an unexampled proof of the resources of our countrymen, and their confidence in public measures. On the first day of opening the subscription, the whole number of shares (twenty thousand) were taken up in one hour, and application made for upwards of four thousand shares more than were granted by the institution, besides many others that were coming in from different quarters.”
In reference to the future seat of government the president said: “I am now happy to add, that all matters between the proprietors of the soil and the public are settled to the mutual satisfaction of both parties, and that the business of laying out the city, the grounds for public buildings, walks, et cetera, is advancing under the inspection of Major L'Enfant with pleasing prospects.”
L'Enfant, who had served as an engineer in the continental army, and was employed to furnish a plan for, and make a survey of, the federal city, spent a week at Mount Vernon, immediately after Washington's return from his southern tour, in submitting his plans to the president, and in consulting with him about the future. These plans were approved by Washington, and met the approbation of Congress when laid before them at the next session. The city was laid out upon a plot containing eight square miles.
The first session of the second Congress commenced at Philadelphia on the twenty-fourth of October, in conformity to an act of the last session of the first Congress. Washington had spent a greater portion of the summer in the federal city, in close attention to public duties; but for six weeks previous to the assembling of the national legislature he remained in the seclusion of Mount Vernon. It was not for him a season of repose. Every mail brought him numerous letters, most of them on public business. Many of them gave him themes for deep and solemn meditation; for national affairs at home and abroad were assuming forms and attitudes that occasioned him much anxiety.
The French revolution, in which his friend Lafayette was engaged as a chief actor, was exhibiting a most alarming and disappointing aspect to the friends of genuine liberty; and the dreams of the marquis, that his country was speedily to be redeemed from disorder and corrupt rule, were disturbed by dismal visions of reality. “Whatever expectations I had conceived of a speedy termination to our revolutionary troubles,” he wrote to Washington as early as the previous March, “I still am tossed about in the ocean of factions and commotions of every kind; for it is my fate to be attacked on each side with equal animosity; on the one by the aristocratic, slavish, parliamentary, clerical—in a word, by all the enemies to my free and levelling doctrine—and on the other by the Orleans factions, anti-royal, licentious, and pillaging parties of every kind: so that my personal escape from amidst so many hostile bands is rather dubious, although our great and good revolution is, thank Heaven, not only insured in France, but on the point of visiting other parts of the world, provided the restoration of public order is soon obtained in this country, where the good people have been better taught how to overthrow despotism than they can understand how to submit to the laws. To you, my dear general, the patriarch and generalissimo of universal liberty, I shall render exact accounts of the conduct of your deputy and aid in that great cause.”
In May he wrote: “I wish it were in my power to give you an assurance that our troubles are at an end, and our constitution totally established. But, although dark clouds are still before us, we have come so far as to foresee the moment when the legislative corps will succeed this convention; and, unless foreign powers interfere, I hope that within four months your friend will have resumed the life of a private and quiet citizen. The rage of parties, even among the patriots, is gone as far as it is possible, short of bloodshed; but, although hatreds are far from subsiding, matters do not appear so much disposed as they formerly were towards collision among the supporters of the popular cause. I myself am exposed to the envy and attacks of all parties—for this simple reason, that whoever acts or means wrong finds me an insuperable obstacle. And there appears a kind of phenomenon in my situation—all parties against me, and a national popularity, which, in spite of every effort, has remained unchanged.... Given up to all the madness of license, faction, and popular rage, I stood alone in defence of the law, and turned the tide into the constitutional channel.”