Show f f A A v u i installment 18 lie was cut to the quick that his own officers should deem him an ad willing to advance his own power at the expense of the very principles he had fought tor ills thought must have gone back at a bound to bis old comradeship ath brother lawrence with the fair faxes george mason and the leea and all that free company of gentle men in the northern neck who revered law loved liberty and bated ft usurper but he could not blink the just corn plaines plaints and real grievances of the army nor did he wish to though others were angry after manner be scorned no man s grief or indignation waa deeper than his that the arm should be left penniless after all it had suffered and done and be threatened besides with being turned adrift without reward or hope of pro for the future justice to the army no man possesses a more sincere wish to see ample justice done to the army than I 1 do he had declared to colonel nicola and as tar as my power and influence in a cons titu way extend they shall be employed to the utmost of my abilities to effect it the pledge was fulfilled in almost every letter be wrote private or pub 1 lie lie urged the states as he urged the congress in season and out of sea son to see justice done the men who bad won the revolution and whom he loved as it they had been of his own blood his counsel disregarded but even fals great voice went loo long unheeded the spirit of party private interest slowness and na indolence slacken suspend and overthrow the best concerted measures the abbe robin had observed upon his first coming with rochambeau and now measures were not so much as concerted until a final menace from the army brought the country to its senses A troubled summer came and went and another winter of anxious doubt und ineffectual counsel the very approach of peace as it tew more certain quickened the angry fears of the army lest should be made a pretext when it came to disperse them before their demands could be driven home upon the demoralized and reluctant govern dent they were learning to despise another spring and the mischief so long maturing was ripe it looked as if even washington could not prevent it A menace from the army it had been rumored in philadelphia while the winter held that the array had secretly determined not to lay down their arms until due provision and a satisfactory prospect should be afforded on the subject of their pay and that washington had grown unpopular among almost all ranks because of his harshness against every unlawful means of securing justice ills extreme reserve mixed some ahmes with a degree of asperity of temper both of which were said to have increased of late bad contribute contri but ed to the decline of his popularity 0 o ran the report and it grew every ateek the more unlikely he could check the treasonable purposes of bis men springing the mine in march 1783 the mine was drung and then men learned by a new sign what power there as in the silent man how be could handle disaffection and disarm reproach an open address was spread broad east through the camp calling upon the army to use its power to obtain its rights and inviting a meeting of the officers to devise a way can you consent to be ahe sufferers by this revolution if you can go carry with you the ridicule and what Is worse the pity of the world go starve and bo forgotten but if you have a enough to discover and spirit enough to oppose tyranny awake attend to your situation and redress yourselves such were its kindling phrases and no man need deceive himself with thinking they would go unheeded checkmates Check mates the movement washington showed his tact and mastery by assuming immediate con arol of the movement with a sharp rebuke tor such a breach ot manly propriety and soldierly discipline but with no thought to stay a righteous protest lie himself summoned the officers ind when they had come together stepped to the desk before them with no show of anger or offended dignity but very gravely with a sort ot majesty it moved one strangely to seo und taking a written paper from hie pocket adjusted his spectacles to read it gentleman ho said very elm ply you will permit me to put on my for I 1 have not only grown tray but algoet blind in the service et my country again a victor there were wet eyes upon the in bent in the room no man me he read read words ot admani 1 alon ot counsel and of bope which burned at the ear and when he was done and had withdrawn leaving them to do what they would they did nothing of which he could be ashamed they spoke manfully as was right ot what they deemed it juat and am lve the congress should d for them but they resolved unanimous ly that at the of the present war the officers ot the amer lean army engaged in the service ot their country from the purest isa and attachment to the rights and liberties of human nature which motives belll exist in the highest degree and that no circumstances of distress or danger shall induce a conduct that may tend to sully the reputation and glory which they have acquired at the price of their blood and eight years services cervices vices urges congress to act washington knew nevertheless how black a danger lurked among these distressed men did not fall to speak plainly ot it to the congress and breathed freely again only when the soldiers just demanda bad at last in some measure been met by at any rate the proper legislation he grew weary with longing tor peace when the work seemed done and hi thoughts and leisure to turn towards bis hosae again but once in all the lengthened days ot had he seen mount ver noa lie had turned aside to spend a night or two there on his way to yorktown and he had seen the loved place again for a little after the victory was won now amidst profitless days at new burgh or in counsel with the commit tees of the congress upon business that was never finished while affairs stood as it were in a sort of paralysis waiting upon the interminable con ferencek feren ces of the three powers who hag aled over definitive terms of peace at paris home seemed to him in hie weariness more to be desired than ever before sorrow at mount vernon private had stricken him at the very moment of his triumph scarcely had the victory at yorktown been celebrated when he waa called november 1781 to the death bed of jack custis his wayward but dearly loved stepson and had there to endure the sight of his wife s grief and the young widows hopeless sorrow added to his own the two youngest children be claimed for bieselt bim with that wistful fatherly longing that had always marked him and mount vernon seemed to him more like a haven than ever where to seek rest and solace the two years he had yet to wait may well have seemed to him the longest of his life and may have added a touch of their own to what strangers deemed his sternness washington had seldom seemed so stern as in one incident of those try ing months an officer of the american army had been taken in a skirmish and the english had permitted a brutal corn pany of loyalists under one captain lippincott to take him from his prison in new york and wantonly hang him in broad daylight on the heights near middletown washington at once notified the britis commander that unless the murderers were delivered up to be punished a british officer would be chosen by lot from among hie pris boners to suffer in their stead and when reparation was withheld pro acceded without hesitation to carry bis threat into execution the lot fell upon captain charles asgill an engaging youth of only nineteen the heir of a great english family lady asgill the lads amther did not stop short of moving the very french court itself to intervene to save her son and at last the congress counseled his release the english commander having disavowed the act of the murderers in whose place he was to suffer and washington him having asked to be directed what be should do captain asgill has been released washington wrote to vergennes Verg enaes in answer to the great ministers intercession I 1 have no right to assume any particular merit from the lenient manner in which this disagreeable at fair has terminated but I 1 beg you to believe sir that I 1 most sincerely rejoice not only because your hu mane intentions are gratified but because the event accords with the wishes of his most christian ma jesty A great weight lifted it lifted a great weight from his heart to have the innocent boy to go unhurt from his hands and he wrote almost tenderly to him in acquainting qua inting him with his release but it was of his simple nature to have sent the lad to abo gallows ne less had things continued to stand as they were at first lie was to check perfidy and vindicate the just rules of wary men were reminded while the of the hanging of andre arnold britlon confederate in treason and how lees the commander ln chief had seemed in sending the tranh accomplished gentleman to his disgraceful death like any com spy granting him not even the favor to be shot like a soldier it beamed hard to learn the inflexible lines upon which that consistent mind worked ac it it had gone to school to fate woodby to his officers but no one deemed him bard or tena or so much as a thought more or lesa than human when at last the british had withdrawn from new york and be amidst bla in fraince s tavern to say goodby II 11 could hardly speak or emotion he could only lift bis glass and say i with heart full ot love and agrati tude I 1 now take my leave ot you most devoutly wishing that your lat days may be prosperous and happy as your former ones have been elor lons aad honorable I 1 cannot bemo to each 0 you and take my leave he said but shall be obliged if you will come and take me by the hand A fervent parting athen general knox who stood Be arest approached him he drew him to alia with a sudden impulse and 1 assed him and not a soldier among them all went away without an em brace troa this roan who was deemed cold and distant after the parting they fallowes fallowed fall owed him in silence to whitehall ferry and saw him take boat for aja journey and standing before the con freaa at annapolis to resign his corn lie added the crowning tench of to his just repute as a man berend ethers noble and sincere HI commission I 1 have now the honor of offering my sincere congratulations to con gress he said he stood amidst the august scene they had prepared for him and f presenting myself before them to surrender into their hands the trust committed to me and to dalm the indulgence of retiring from the service of my country happy in the confirmation of our independence and sovereignty and pleased with the opportunity afford ed the united states of becoming a respectable nation I 1 resign with sat the appointment I 1 accepted with diffidence diffidence in my abilities to accomplish so arduous a task which however was superseded by a confidence in the rectitude ot our a the support of the power of the union and the patronage f herven the termination of the war baa verified the most sanguine ex and my gratitude for the interposition of providence and the as si stance I 1 have received from my countrymen increases with every review of the momentous contest I 1 consider it my indispensable duty to close this last solemn act ot my official life by commending the interests of our dearest country to the protection of almighty god and those who have the superintendence of them to bis holy keeping it was as it spoken on the morrow of the day upon which he accepted hia commission the same diffidence the same trust in a power greater and higher than his own an idol and a hero the plaudits pl audits that hid but just now filled his ears at every stage of his long journey from new york seemed utterly forgotten he seemed not to know how hia fellow countrymen had made of him an idol and a hero bis simplicity was once again bis acthen tic badge of genuineness he knew it would seem no other way in which to act A little child remembered afterwards how he had prayed at her father s house upon the eve of battle how he had taken scripture out of jeshua and had cried the lord god of beds the lord god of gods he and israel he shall know it ho in rebellion or it la transgress trans gres slon against the lord save us net this day there way here the same note of solemnity and of self forgetful devo alon as it duty and honor were alike inevitable on christmas eve ashington was once more at mount vernon to resume the life he loved more than victory and power he bad a zest for the means and the labor ot succeeding but not for the mere content of success he put the revolution behind him as he would have laid aside a book that was read turned from it as quietly aa he had turned from receiving the surrender of at yorktown n interested la victory not as a pageant and field of alery but only as a means to an end ho looked to find very sweet satis faction in the peace which war had earned as sufficient a scope for his powers at home as in the field once more be would be n virginian and join hie strength to his neigh bors in all the tasks of good catl he bad seen nothing of the old familiar place since that faraway spring in the bear when he had left hie farming and hia amidst rumors of war to the congress which was to send him to cambridge he bad halted at fred K I 1 fl ipke lt t indeed with the count da rochambeau Ho two years ago ere be followed hie army from york to ita poets upon the mrs lewis his bister bad returned one day from visiting a neighbor in the quiet town to look in astonishment upon an officer 8 horses and attend ants at her door and had entered to find her beloved brother stretched upon her own bed within sound asleep in bis clothes like a boy from hunting takes his mother to ball there bad been a formal ball given too in celebration of the victory before the french officers and the com mander in chet left to go northward again aad washington had had the joy of entering the room in the face of the gay company with his bed mother on his arm not a whit bent tor all her seventy tour years and as quiet as a queen at receiving the homage 0 bar son comrade ab arms he had got his imperious spirit of command from her A servant had told her that mars george bad put up at the tavern go and tell george to come here instantly st she bad commanded and he bad come masterful man though be was he had felt every old affection and every om allegiance renew itself as be saw former neighbors crowd around him and that little glimpse of virginia had refreshed him like a tonic deeply and as if it renewed his vey nature as only a silent man can be refreshed hut a few days in fredericks burg and at mount vernon then bad been only an incident of campaigning only a grateful pause on a marh back to private life now at as be bad come back to keep his home and be a neighbor again as he had not been these nine years it was not the same virginia nor even the same home and neighborhood he had gone from that washington came back to when the war was done he had left mount vernon in the care of lund washington his nephew while the war lasted and had not forgotten amidst all his letter riling to send seasonable directions ad main tain a constant oversight upon the management of bis estate rebukes his nephew it was part of his genius to find time for everything and mount vernon had suffered something less than the or binary hazards and neglects of war it had suffered less upon one occasion indeed than its proud owner could have found it in his heart to wish in the spring of several british vessels bad come pillaging within the potomac and the anxious lund had regaled their officers with refresh menta from mount vernon to buy them off aroi mischief it would have been a less painful circumstance to me his uncompromising uncle had written him to have heard that in consequence of your non compliance with their request they had burnt my house and laid the plantation in ruta |