Accept my affectionate and mournful sentiment.
LAFAYETTE.
The day after he received his father's letter he left Washington and wrote from Baltimore, where he stopped over Sunday with a friend, on February 13:—
MY DEAR FATHER,—The heart-rending tidings which you communicated reached me in Washington on Friday evening. I left yesterday morning, spend this day here at Mr. Cushing's, and set out on my return home to-morrow. I shall reach Philadelphia on Monday night, New York on Tuesday night, and New Haven on Wednesday night.
Oh! is it possible, is it possible? Shall I never see my dear wife again?
But I cannot trust myself to write on this subject. I need your prayers and those of Christian friends to God for support. I fear I shall sink under it.
Oh! take good care of her dear children.
Your agonized son,
FINLEY.
Another son had been born to him on January 20, 1825, and he was now left with three motherless children to provide for, and without the sustaining hope of a speedy and permanent reunion with them and with his beloved wife.
Writing to a friend more than a month after the death of his wife, he says:—