The land was purchased from four planters—Young, Carroll, Davidson, and David Burns. Mr. Burns was not willing to part with his land at the rates offered. When Washington remonstrated, the old Scotchman said: "I suppose, Mr. Washington, you think that people are going to take every grist that comes from you as pure grain; but who would you have been if you had not married the widow Custis?"
Posterity is apt to inquire, Who would ever have heard of the widow Custis if she had not married George Washington?
But government had ways, then as now, of bringing about conclusions when property was wanted for public purposes.
II
A GENIUS FROM FRANCE
Among the pathetic figures of the early days of the Capitol City is that of Major Pierre Charles L'Enfant, who was selected by Washington to draft plans for the new city.
L'Enfant was a skilful engineer who had come to America with Lafayette in 1777. He did not go back to France with his countrymen in 1783, but remained in this country, and was employed by Washington as an engineer in several places.
He devoted the summer of 1791 to planning, not the capital of a small nation, but a city which could be sufficiently enlarged should this continent be densely populated from the Atlantic to the Pacific.
There was no other man in this country at that time who had such knowledge of art and engineering as Major L'Enfant. Plans of Frankfort-on-the-Main, Carlsruhe, Amsterdam, Paris, Orleans, Turin, Milan, and other European cities were sent to him from Philadelphia by Washington, who had obtained the plan of each of these cities by his own personal effort.
