should be doubly so in this home of Washington’s; but, bare of all save
the empty cases in the wall, it is the gloomiest of all. Books all gone,
and the occupation of the room by the present residents deprives it of
any attractions it might otherwise have. Here, early in the morning and
late at night, he worked continuously, keeping up his increasing
correspondence and managing his vast responsibilities.
Murmurs of another war reached him as he sat at his table planning rural
improvements, and from this room he wrote accepting the position no
other could fill while he lived.
Here death found him, the night before his last illness, when cold and
hoarse he came in from his long ride, and warmed himself by his library
fire. That night he went up to his room over this favorite study, and
said in reply to a member of his family as he passed out, who urged him
to do something for it, “No, you know I never take any thing for a cold.
Let it go as it came.”
The winds and rains of eighty-odd years have beaten upon that sacred
home on the high banks of the silvery waters beneath, since the widowed,
weary wife was laid to rest beside her noble dead, and the snows of
winter and storms of summer have left its weather-worn and stained front
looking like some ghost of other days left alone to tell of its former
life and beauty. In its lonely grandeur it stands appealing to us for
that reverence born of sentiments, stirred by the recollections of the
great and good.
There was no resisting the feelings of gloomy depression as we passed
out the front toward the river, and took the path leading to the tomb.
Far down the side of the hill, perched on a knoll surrounded by trees, a
summer-house was seen, and the walk leading by many angles down to it.
The view of the river is said to be fine from this point, but we did not
undertake the difficulties of getting to it. The wooden steps
constructed across the ravines are fast sinking to ruin, and the swollen
stream from the side of the hill dashing against them, was distinctly
audible to us as we stood far above. The swallows and bats seem to have
built their nests in its forsaken interior, and we were not inclined to
molest them.
Many times we looked back at the old homestead endeared to every
American, and stamped upon memory each portion of its outlines.
High above it, the small cupola sported its little glittering
weather-vane as brilliant as though it had been gilded but yesterday.
Here again was an object which unconsciously associated Washington with
his namesake, Washington Irving. In the pleasant summer-time I had stood
in front of the little “Woolfort’s Roost,” and enjoyed to the finest
fibre of feeling its lovely simplicity. Above it, too, a little
weather-cock coquetted with the wind as it swept down from Tappan Zee,
the same said to have been carefully removed from the Vander Hayden
palace at Albany, and placed there by tender hands long years ago. Upon
the side of the hill I had stopped then as now, and looked back at the
house above, embosomed in vines interspersed with delicately tinted
fuchsias.
Even as we were standing now looking for the first and perhaps the last
time upon Mount Vernon, so in the beautiful harvest month we had gazed
upon the Hudson, spread out like a vast panorama with its graceful
yachts and swift schooners, and descended the winding path to the
water’s edge. But Mount Vernon was dressed in winter’s dreariness, and
its desolate silence oppressed rather than elevated the feelings. It is
a fit place for meditation and communion, and to a spiritual nature the
influences of the ancient home are full of harmony. When the only
approach was by conveyance from Alexandria, the visitors were not so
numerous as since the days of a daily steamer from Washington City, and
much of the solemnity usually felt for so renowned a spot is marred by
the coarse remarks and thoughtless acts of the many who saunter through
the grounds.
A gay party of idlers had arranged their eatables upon the stone steps
of the piazza, and sat in the sunshine laughing merrily. Even those old
rocks smoothly worn, where so often had stood the greatest of men, were
not hallowed nor protected from the selfish convenience of unrefined
people. Callous, indeed, must be the heart which could walk unmoved
through so endeared a scene. To tread the haunts where men have thought
and acted great, is ennobling to sensitive organizations, and to linger
over evidences of olden times inspires all generous minds with
enthusiasm.
The grounds roll downward from the mansion house, and in a green hollow
midway between that and the river, and about one hundred and fifty yards
west from the summer-house, and thirty rods from the house, is the vault
where reposed the remains of Washington and Martha his wife. Now the
tomb contains about thirty members of his family, and is sealed up, and
in front of the main vault, enclosed by an iron railing, are the two
sarcophagi containing the ashes of husband and wife. “A melancholy glory
kindles around that cold pile of marble,” and we stood mute in thought.
But before reaching it we pass the old vault where for a few years he
was buried. The few cedars on it are withered and the door stands open,
presenting a desolate appearance. With vines and flowers, and leafy
trees filled with singing birds, this sight would perhaps be less
chilling; but the barren aspects of nature united with the solemn
stillness of the country, conspired to freeze every thought of life and
beauty, and the mind dwelt upon the rust of decay.[5]
Footnote 5:
This sketch was written previous to the restoration of the place by
the Ladies’ Mount Vernon Association. Now it has been restored as far
as possible, and many old relics have been returned to their
apartments. The equestrian portrait of Washington by Rembrandt Peale,
the harpsichord which was presented by Washington to his
step-daughter, and which is well preserved, together with many old
paintings and Revolutionary relics, adorn the once bare rooms. The bed
on which Washington died has been restored to its place, and a number
of pieces of furniture in the house at the time of Mrs. Washington’s
death are again there. The grounds have been put in excellent order,
and the old farm is cultivated and yields a revenue to the Mount
Vernon Ladies’ Association, which deserves unbounded credit for
rescuing the grand old place from destruction, and restoring it as far
as possible to its former appearance and condition.
Lafayette stopped at Mount Vernon when about to return to France after
his visit to this country, in 1826, having reserved for the last his
visit to Washington’s Tomb, and the scene is thus described by Mr.
Seward in his Life of John Quincy Adams:
“When the boat came opposite the tomb of Washington, at Mount Vernon, it
paused in its progress. Lafayette arose. The wonders which he had
performed for a man of his age, in successfully accomplishing labors
enough to have tested his meridian vigor, whose animation rather
resembled the spring than the winter of life, now seemed unequal to the
task he was about to perform—to take a last look at ‘The Tomb of
Washington!’
“He advanced to the effort. A silence the most impressive reigned
around, till the strains of sweet and plaintive music completed the
grandeur and sacred solemnity of the scene. All hearts beat in unison
with the throbbings of the veteran’s bosom, as he looked _for the last
time_ on the sepulchre which contained the ashes of the first of men! He
spoke not, but appeared absorbed in the mighty recollections which the
place and the occasion inspired.”
During the summer of 1860, Albert, Prince of Wales, and heir apparent to
the throne of England, visited, in company with President Buchanan, the
tomb of Washington. Here amid the gorgeous beauties of a southern
summer, the grandson of George the Third forgot his royalty in the
presence of departed worth; and bent his knee in awe before a mere
handful of ashes, which, but for the cold marble encompassing them,
would be blown to the four winds of the earth. It was a strange sight to
see that bright, youthful form kneeling before the tomb of the Father of
his Country, and attesting his appreciation of the great spirit which
more than any other wrested its broad domains from him.
Stealthily the years go by, and we wist not they are passing, yet the
muffled and hoarse voice of a century astounds us with its parting. The
centennial birthdays have been celebrated; we have passed the hundredth
anniversary of victories won and independence achieved. If the glad,
free spirits of the Chief and his companion are permitted to review
their earthly pilgrimage, let it be a source of gratification to us to
know they smile upon a Republic of peace. Their bodies we guard, while
they crumbled away in the bosom of their birth-place, and as long as a
son of America remains a freeman, it will be a well-spring of
inspiration to feel that Virginia contains the _Pater Patriæ_ and the
woman immortalized by his love.
[Illustration: Painted by G. Stuart Engraved by G. F. Storm. A Adams]
II.
ABIGAIL ADAMS.
Abigail Smith, the daughter of a New England Congregationalist minister,
was born at Weymouth, in 1744. Her father was the settled pastor of that
place for more than forty years, and her grandfather was also a minister
of the same denomination in a neighboring town.
The younger years of her life were passed in the quiet seclusion of her
grandfather’s house; and under the instructions of her grandmother, she
imbibed most of the lessons which were the most deeply impressed upon
her mind. “I have not forgotten,” she says in a letter to her own
daughter, in the year 1795, “the excellent lessons which I received from
my grandmother at a very early period of life; I frequently think they
made a more durable impression upon my mind than those which I received
from my own parents. This tribute is due to the memory of those virtues,
the sweet remembrance of which will flourish, though she has long slept
with her ancestors.”
Separated from the young members of her own family, and never subjected
to the ordinary school routine, her imaginative faculties bade fair to
develop at the expense of her judgment, but the austere religion of her
ancestors, and the daily example of strict compliance to forms,
prevented the too great indulgence of fancy. She had many relations both
on the father’s and mother’s side, and with these she was upon as
intimate terms as circumstances would allow. The distance between the
homes of the young people was, however, too great, and the means of
their parents too narrow, to admit of very frequent personal
intercourse, the substitute for which was a rapid interchange of written
communication. “The women of the last century,” observes Mr. Charles
Francis Adams in his memoir of his grandmother, “were more remarkable
for their letter-writing propensities, than the novel-reading and more
pretending daughters of this era: their field was larger, and the
stirring events of the times made it an object of more interest. Now,
the close connection between all parts of this country, and rapid means
of transmitting intelligence through the medium of telegraphs and
newspapers, renders the slow process of writing letters unnecessary,
save in instances of private importance. The frugal habits of the
sparsely settled country afforded little material for the fashionable
chit-chat which forms so large a part of the social life of to-day, and
the limited education of woman was another drawback to the indulgence of
a pleasure in which they really excelled. Upon what, then, do we base
the assertion that they were remarkable for their habits of writing?
Even though self-taught, the young ladies of Massachusetts were
certainly readers, and their taste was not for the feeble and nerveless
sentiments, but was derived from the deepest wells of English
literature. Almost every house in the colony possessed some old
heir-looms in the shape of standard books, even if the number was
limited to the Bible and dictionary. Many, especially ministers, could
display relics of their English ancestors’ intelligence in the libraries
handed down to them, and the study of their contents was evident in many
of the grave correspondences of that early time.” To learning, in the
ordinary sense of that term, she could make no claim. She did not enjoy
an opportunity to acquire even such as there might have been, for the
delicate state of her health forbade the idea of sending her away from
home to obtain them. In speaking of her deficiencies, the year before
her death, she says: “My early education did not partake of the abundant
opportunity which the present day offers, and which even our common
country schools now afford. _I never was sent to any school_, I was
always sick.” Although Massachusetts ranked then, as it does now, first
in point of educational facilities, it is certainly remarkable that its
women received such entire neglect. “It is not impossible,” says Mr.
Adams, “that the early example of Mrs. Hutchison, and the difficulties
in which the public exercise of her gifts involved the colony, had
established in the public mind a conviction of the danger that may
attend the meddling of women with abstruse points of doctrine; and
these, however they might confound the strongest intellects, were
nevertheless the favorite topics of thought and discussion in that
generation.”
While the sons of a family received every possible advantage compatible
with the means of the father, the daughter’s interest, as far as mental
culture was concerned, was generally ignored. To aid the mother in
manual household labor, and by self-denial and increased industry to
forward the welfare of the brothers, was the most exalted height to
which any woman aspired. To women there was then no career open, no
life-work to perform outside the narrow walls of home. Every idea of
self-culture was swallowed up in the wearying routine of practical life,
and what of knowledge they obtained, was from the society of the
learned, and the eagerness with which they treasured and considered the
conversations of others.
On the 26th of October, 1764, Abigail Smith was married to John Adams.
She was at the time twenty years old. The match, although a suitable one
in many respects, was not considered brilliant, since her ancestors were
among the most noted of the best class of their day, and he was the son
of a farmer of limited means, and as yet a lawyer without practice. Mrs.
Adams was the second of three daughters, whose characters were alike
strong and remarkable for their intellectual force. The fortunes of two
of them confined its influence to a sphere much more limited than that
which fell to the lot of Mrs. Adams. Mary, the eldest, was married in
1762 to Richard Cranch, an English emigrant, who subsequently became a
Judge of the Court of Common Pleas in Massachusetts. Elizabeth, the
youngest, was twice married; first to the Reverend John Shaw, minister
of Haverhill, and after his death, to the Reverend Mr. Peabody, of New
Hampshire. This anecdote is told in connection with the marriage of Mrs.
Adams. When her eldest sister was married, her father preached to his
people from the text, “And Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall
not be taken away from her.” The disapprobation to his second daughter’s
choice was due to the prejudice entertained against the profession of
the law. Mr. Adams, besides being a lawyer, was the son of a small
farmer of the middle class in Braintree, and was thought scarcely good
enough to match with the minister’s daughter, descended from a line of
ministers in the colony. Mr. Smith’s parishioners were outspoken in
their opposition, and he replied to them immediately, after the marriage
took place, in a sermon, in which he made pointed allusion to the
objection against lawyers. His text on this occasion was, “For John came
neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and ye say, He _hath a devil_.”
Mr. Smith, it may be as well to add, was in the habit of making
application of texts to events which in any manner interested himself or
his congregation. In a colony founded so exclusively upon motives of
religious zeal as Massachusetts was, it necessarily followed that the
ordinary distinctions of society were in a great degree subverted, and
that the leaders of the church, though without worldly possessions to
boast of, were the most in honor everywhere. If a festive entertainment
was meditated, the minister was sure to be first on the list of those
invited. If any assembly of citizens was held, he must be there to open
the business with prayer. If a political measure was in agitation, he
was among the first whose opinions were to be consulted. He was not
infrequently the family physician. Hence the objection to Mr. Adams by
her friends was founded on the fact that she was the daughter and
granddaughter of a minister, and his social superior according to the
opinions of zealous Christians, whose prejudices were extreme toward a
calling they deemed hardly honest.
Ten years of quiet home-life succeeded her marriage, during which time
little transpired worthy of record. “She appears to have passed an
apparently very happy life, having her residence in Braintree, or in
Boston, according as the state of her husband’s health, then rather
impaired, or that of his professional practice, made the change
advisable. Within this period she became the mother of a daughter and of
three sons.”
Mr. Adams was elected one of the delegates on the part of Massachusetts,
instructed to meet persons chosen in the same manner from the other
colonies, for the purpose of consulting in common upon the course most
advisable to be adopted by them. In the month of August, 1774, he left
home in company with Samuel Adams, Thomas Cushings, and Robert Treat
Paine, to go to Philadelphia, at which place the proposed assembly was
to be held. In two months, Mr. Adams was home again. Congress met again
in May, 1775, and Mr. Adams returned to Philadelphia to attend it. The
long distance was traversed on horseback, and was replete with
hardships. At Hartford he heard of the memorable incident at Lexington,
only five days after his departure from Braintree. Up to this time, the
trouble between the two countries had been a dispute, henceforth it
resolved itself into open hostilities.
“In November, 1775,” says Bancroft, “Abigail Smith, the wife of John
Adams, was at her home near the foot of Penn Hill, charged with the sole
care of their little brood of children; managing their farm; keeping
house with frugality, though opening her doors to the houseless, and
giving with good-will a part of her scant portion to the poor; seeking
work for her own hands, and ever busily occupied, now at the spinning
wheel, now making amends for having never been sent to school by
learning French, though with the aid of books alone. Since the departure
of her husband for Congress, the arrow of death had sped near her by
day, and the pestilence that walks in darkness had entered her humble
mansion. She herself was still weak after a violent illness; her house
was a hospital in every part; and such was the distress of the
neighborhood, she could hardly find a well person to assist in looking
after the sick. Her youngest son had been rescued from the grave by her
nursing. Her own mother had been taken away, and after the austere
manner of her forefathers, buried without prayer. Woe followed woe, and
one affliction trod on the heels of another. Winter was hurrying on;
during the day family affairs took off her attention, but her long
evenings, broken by the sound of the storm on the ocean, or the enemy’s
artillery at Boston, were lonesome and melancholy. Ever in the silent
night ruminating on the love and tenderness of her departed parent, she
needed the consolation of her husband’s presence; but when she read the
king’s proclamation, she willingly gave up her nearest friend
exclusively to his perilous duties, and sent him her cheering message:
‘This intelligence will make a plain path for you, though a dangerous
one. I could not join to-day in the petitions of our worthy pastor for a
reconciliation between our no longer parent state, but tyrant state, and
these colonies. Let us separate; they are unworthy to be our brethren.
Let us renounce them; and instead of supplications, as formerly, for
their prosperity and happiness, let us beseech the Almighty to blast
their counsels and bring to naught all their devices.’”
Such words of patriotism falling from the lips of a woman who had just
buried three members of her household, one her own mother, and who was
alone with her four little children within sight of the cannonading at
Boston, discovers a mind strong, and a spirit fearless and brave under
scenes of harrowing distress.
Now she was alone, and she writes to her husband, “The desolation of war
is not so distressing as the havoc made by the pestilence. Some poor
parents are mourning the loss of three, four, and five children, and
some families are wholly stripped of every member.” December found Mr.
Adams once more at home to cheer his suffering family, but Congress
demanded his presence, and after a stay of one month, he returned again
to the halls of the nation. March came, and her anxious, solitary life
was in nowise brightened. The distance, in those days of slow travel and
bad roads, from Boston to Philadelphia was immense, and letters were
precious articles hard to receive. In speaking of the anticipated attack
on Boston, she says: “It has been said to-morrow and to-morrow; but when
the dreadful to-morrow will be I know not.” Yet even as she wrote, the
first peal of the American guns rang out their dissonance on the
chilling night winds, and the house shook and trembled from cellar to
garret. It was no time for calm thoughts now, and she left her letter
unfinished to go out and watch the lurid lights that flashed and
disappeared in the distance. Next morning she walked to Penn’s Hill,
where she sat listening to the amazing roar, and watching the British
shells as they fell round about the camps of her friends. Her home at
the foot of the hill was all her earthly wealth, and the careful
husbanding of each year’s crop her only income; yet while she ever and
anon cast her eye upon it, the thoughts that welled into words were not
of selfish repinings, but of proud expressions of high-souled
patriotism. “The cannonade is from our army,” she continues, “and the
sight is one of the grandest in nature, and is of the true species of
the sublime. ’Tis now an incessant roar. To-night we shall realize a
more terrible scene still; I wish myself with you out of hearing, as I
cannot assist them, but I hope to give you joy of Boston, even if it is
in ruins before I send this away.” But events were not ordered as she
feared, and the result was more glorious than she dared hope. All the
summer the army lay encamped around Boston, and in early fall her
husband came home again, after an absence of nearly a year. Yet his
coming brought her little satisfaction, since it was to announce the sad
truth that he had been chosen Minister to France. Could he take his wife
and little ones? was the oft-recurring question. A small and not very
good vessel had been ordered to carry him: the British fleet knew this,
and were on the watch to capture it. On every account it was deemed best
he should go alone, but he finally concluded to take his eldest son,
John Quincy Adams, to bear him company, and in February, 1778, sailed
for Europe.
The loneliness of the faithful wife can hardly be understood by those
unacquainted with the horrors of war. Yet doubtless there are many, very
many, who in the dark gloom of the civil war can record similar feelings
of agony, and can trace a parallel in the solitary musings of this brave
matron. The ordinary occupations of the female sex have ever confined
them to a very limited sphere, and there is seldom an occasion when they
can with propriety extend their exertions beyond the domestic hearth.
Only through the imagination can they give unlimited scope to those
powers which the world until recently has never understood, and which
are even now but dimly defined. Had mankind given them the privileges of
a liberal education, and freedom to carve their own destiny, to what
dazzling heights would a mind so naturally gifted as Mrs. Adams’, have
attained? Circumscribed as her lot was, she has left upon the pages of
history an enviable record, and while Americans forget not to do honor
to her husband’s zeal and greatness, her memory lends a richer perfume,
and sheds a radiance round the incidents of a life upon which she
wielded so beneficial an influence.
Ofttimes weather-bound and compelled to remain indoors for days, with no
society save her children and domestics, it is not strange that she
should be lonely. Nor could her mind dwell upon any pleasing
anticipations for the future. Her husband three thousand miles away, a
hostile army encompassing the country, poor and forlorn, she yet so
managed and controlled her little estate, that it served to support her,
and in old age, to prove the happy asylum of her honored family. Mr.
Adams knew her exposed condition, yet trusted to her judgment to protect
herself and little ones. On a former occasion he had written to her “in
case of danger to fly to the woods,” and now he could only reiterate the
same advice, at the same time feeling that she was strong and resolute
to sustain herself. Six months passed, and Mrs. Adams writes to him: “I
have never received a syllable from you or my dear son, and it is five
months since I had an opportunity of conveying a line to you. Yet I know
not but you are less a sufferer than you would be to hear from us, to
know our distresses, and yet be unable to relieve them. The universal
cry for bread to a humane heart is painful beyond description.” Mr.
Adams returned to his family after an absence of eighteen months, but no
sooner was he established in his happy home, than he was ordered to
Great Britain to negotiate a peace. Two of his sons accompanied him on
this trip. He went over night to Boston to embark early next day, and
the sad heart left behind again, found relief in the following touching
words: “My habitation, how disconsolate it looks! my table, I sit down
to it, but cannot swallow my food! Oh, why was I born with so much
sensibility, and why, possessing it, have I so often been called to
struggle with it? Were I sure you would not be gone, I could not
withstand the temptation of coming to town though my heart would suffer
over again the cruel torture of separation.” Soon after this time, she
wrote to her eldest son in regard to his extreme reluctance at again
crossing the ocean, and for its perspicuity and terseness, for the
loftiness of its sentiments, and the sound logical advice in which it
abounds, ranks itself among the first literary effusions of the century:
“_June, 1778._
“MY DEAR SON: ’Tis almost four months since you left your native land
and embarked upon the mighty waters in quest of a foreign country.
Although I have not particularly written to you since, yet you may be
assured you have constantly been upon my heart and mind.
“It is a very difficult task, my dear son, for a tender parent, to bring
her mind to part with a child of your years, going to a distant land;
nor could I have acquiesced in such a separation under any other care
than that of the most excellent parent and guardian who accompanied you.
You have arrived at years capable of improving under the advantages you
will be likely to have, if you do but properly attend to them. They are
talents put into your hands, of which an account will be required of you
hereafter; and, being possessed of one, two, or four, see to it that you
double your number.
“The most amiable and most useful disposition in a young mind is
diffidence of itself; and this should lead you to seek advice and
instruction from him who is your natural guardian, and will always
counsel and direct you in the best manner, both for your present and
future happiness. You are in possession of a natural good understanding,
and of spirits unbroken by adversity and untamed with care. Improve your
understanding by acquiring useful knowledge and virtue, such as will
render you an ornament to society, an honor to your country, and a
blessing to your parents. Great learning and superior abilities, should
you ever possess them, will be of little value and small estimation,
unless virtue, honor, truth, and integrity are added to them. Adhere to
those religious sentiments and principles which were early instilled
into your mind, and remember that you are accountable to your Maker for
all your words and actions. Let me enjoin it upon you to attend
constantly and steadfastly to the precepts and instructions of your
father, as you value the happiness of your mother and your own welfare.
His care and attention to you render many things unnecessary for me to
write, which I might otherwise do; but the inadvertency and heedlessness
of youth require line upon line and precept upon precept, and, when
enforced by the joint efforts of both parents, will, I hope, have a due
influence upon your conduct; for, dear as you are to me, I would much
rather you should have found your grave in the ocean you have crossed,
or that any untimely death crop you in your infant years, than see you
an immoral, profligate, or graceless child.
“You have entered early in life upon the great theatre of the world,
which is full of temptations and vice of every kind. You are not wholly
unacquainted with history, in which you have read of crimes which your
inexperienced mind could scarcely believe credible. You have been taught
to think of them with horror, and to view vice as
“‘A monster of so frightful mien,
That, to be hated, needs but to be seen.’
Yet you must keep a strict guard upon yourself, or the odious monster
will lose its terror by becoming familiar to you. The modern history of
our own times furnishes as black a list of crimes as can be paralleled
in ancient times, even if we go back to Nero, Caligula, Cæsar Borgia.
Young as you are, the cruel war into which we have been compelled by the
haughty tyrant of Britain and the bloody emissaries of his vengeance,
may stamp upon your mind this certain truth, that the welfare and
prosperity of all countries, communities, and, I may add, individuals,
depend upon their morals. That nation to which we were once united, as
it has departed from justice, eluded and subverted the wise laws which
formerly governed it, and suffered the worst of crimes to go unpunished,
has lost its valor, wisdom, and humanity, and, from being the dread and
terror of Europe, has sunk into derision and infamy.
“But, to quit political subjects, I have been greatly anxious for your
safety, having never heard of the frigate since she sailed, till, about
a week ago, a New York paper informed that she was taken and carried
into Plymouth. I did not fully credit this report, though it gave me
much uneasiness. I yesterday heard that a French vessel was arrived at
Portsmouth, which brought news of the safe arrival of the Boston; but
this wants confirmation. I hope it will not be long before I shall be
assured of your safety. You must write me an account of your voyage, of
your situation, and of every thing entertaining you can recollect.
“Be assured, I am most affectionately
“Your mother, ABIGAIL ADAMS.”
The Government was organized under its present Constitution in April,
1789, and Mr. Adams was elected Vice-President. He established himself
in New York, and from there Mrs. Adams wrote to her sister, “that she
would return to Braintree during the recess of Congress, but the season
of the year renders the attempt impracticable.” She speaks in one of her
letters of the drawing-rooms held by Mrs. Washington, and the many
invitations she received to entertainments. After a residence of one
year in New York, the seat of government was removed to Philadelphia.
She says in a letter to her daughter, “that she dined with the President
in company with the ministers and ladies of the court,” and that “he
asked very affectionately after her and the children,” and “at the table
picked the sugar-plums from a cake and requested me to take them for
Master John.” In February, 1797, Mr. Adams succeeded President
Washington, and from Braintree she wrote to her husband one of the most
beautiful of all her noble effusions:
“‘The sun is dressed in brightest beams
To give thy honors to the day.’
“And may it prove an auspicious prelude to each ensuing season. You have
this day to declare yourself head of a nation. ‘And now, O Lord my God,
thou hast made thy servant ruler over the people; give unto him an
understanding heart, that he may know how to go out and come in before
this great people; that he may discern between good and bad. For who is
able to judge this thy so great a people:’ were the words of a royal
sovereign, and not less applicable to him who is invested with the Chief
Magistracy of a nation, though he wear not a crown nor the robes of
royalty. My thoughts and my meditations are with you, though personally
absent; and my petitions to heaven are that ‘the things which make for
peace may not be hidden from your eyes.’ My feelings are not those of
pride or ostentation upon the occasion. They are solemnized by a sense
of the obligations, the important trusts, and numerous duties connected
with it. That you may be enabled to discharge them with honor to
yourself, with justice and impartiality to your country, and with
satisfaction to this great people, shall be the daily prayer of yours—”
Soon as the funeral rites of Mrs. Adams, the venerable mother of
President Adams, were performed, and the sad leave-takings over, Mrs.
Adams set out to join her husband at Philadelphia, from whence the seat
of government was removed in June, 1800, to Washington City.
Her impression of the place is graphically described in the following
letter to her daughter, Mrs. Smith:
“WASHINGTON, _November 21st, 1800_.
“MY DEAR CHILD:—
“I arrived here on Sunday last, and without meeting with any accident
worth noticing, except losing ourselves when we left Baltimore, and
going eight or nine miles on the Frederick road, by which means we were
obliged to go the other eight through woods, where we wandered two hours
without finding a guide or the path. Fortunately, a straggling black
came up with us, and we engaged him as a guide to extricate us out of
our difficulty. But woods are all you see from Baltimore until you reach
the city,—which is only so in name. Here and there is a small cot,
without a glass window, interspersed amongst the forests, through which
you travel miles without seeing any human being. In the city there are
buildings enough, if they were compact and finished, to accommodate
Congress and those attached to it; but as they are, and scattered as
they are, I see no great comfort for them. The river, which runs up to
Alexandria, is in full view of my window, and I see the vessels as they
pass and repass. The house is upon a grand and superb scale, requiring
about thirty servants to attend and keep the apartments in proper order,
and perform the ordinary business of the house and stables: an
establishment very well proportioned to the President’s salary. The
lighting the apartments, from the kitchen to parlors and chambers, is a
tax indeed; and the fires we are obliged to keep to secure us from daily
agues, is another very cheering comfort. To assist us in this great
castle, and render less attendance necessary, bells are wholly wanting,
not one single one being hung through the whole house, and promises are
all you can obtain. This is so great an inconvenience, that I know not
what to do, or how to do. The ladies from Georgetown and in the city
have many of them visited me. Yesterday I returned fifteen visits,—but
such a place as Georgetown appears,—why our Milton beautiful. But no
comparisons;—if they will put me up some bells, and let me have wood
enough to keep fires, I design to be pleased. I could content myself
almost anywhere three months; but surrounded with forests, can you
believe that wood is not to be had, because people cannot be found to
cut and cart it? Briesler entered into a contract with a man to supply
him with wood; a small part, a few cords only, has he been able to get.
Most of that was expended to dry the walls of the house before we came
in, and yesterday the man told him it was impossible for him to procure
it to be cut and carted. He has had recourse to coals: but we cannot get
grates made and set. We have indeed come into a new country.
“You must keep all this to yourself, and when asked how I like it, say
that I write you the situation is beautiful, which is true. The house is
made habitable, but there is not a single apartment finished, and all
withinside, except the plastering, has been done since Briesler came. We
have not the least fence, yard, or other convenience, without, and the
great unfinished audience-room I make a drying room of, to hang up the
clothes in. The principal stairs are not up, and will not be this
winter. Six chambers are made comfortable; two are occupied by the
President and Mr. Shaw; two lower rooms, one for a common parlor and one
for a levee room. Up-stairs there is the oval room, which is designed
for the drawing-room, and has the crimson furniture in it. It is a very
handsome room now, but when completed will be beautiful. If the twelve
years, in which this place has been considered as the future seat of
government, had been improved, as they would have been if in New
England, very many of the present inconveniences would have been
removed. It is a beautiful spot, capable of every improvement, and the
more I view it, the more I am delighted with it. Since I sat down to
write, I have been called down to a servant from Mount Vernon, with a
billet from Major Custis, and a haunch of venison, and a kind,
congratulatory letter from Mrs. Lewis, upon my arrival in the city, with
Mrs. Washington’s love, inviting me to Mount Vernon, where, health
permitting, I will go, before I leave this place.... Two articles are
much distressed for: the one is bells, but the more important one is
wood. Yet you cannot see wood for trees. No arrangement has been made,
but by promises never performed, to supply the newcomers with fuel. Of
the promises, Briesler had received his full share. He had procured nine
cords of wood: between six and seven of that was kindly burnt up to dry
the walls of the house, which ought to have been done by the
commissioners, but which, if left to them, would have remained undone to
this day. Congress poured in, but shiver, shiver. No wood-cutters nor
carters to be had at any rate. We are now indebted to a Pennsylvania
wagon to bring us, through the first clerk in the Treasury Office, one
cord and a half of wood, which is all we have for this house, where
twelve fires are constantly required, and where, we are told, the roads
will soon be so bad that it cannot be drawn. Briesler procured two
hundred bushels of coal, or we must have suffered. This is the situation
of almost every person. The public officers have sent to Philadelphia
for wood-cutters and wagons.
“The vessel which has my clothes and other matter is not arrived. The
ladies are impatient for a drawing-room; I have no looking-glasses, but
dwarfs, for this house; nor a twentieth part lamps enough to light it.
Many things were stolen, many were broken, by the removal; amongst the
number, my tea-china is more than half missing. Georgetown affords
nothing. My rooms are very pleasant, and warm, whilst the doors of the
hall are closed.
“You can scarce believe that here in this wilderness-city, I should find
myself so occupied as it is. My visitors, some of them, come three and
four miles. The return of one of them is the work of one day. Most of
the ladies reside in Georgetown, or in scattered parts of the city at
two and three miles distance. We have all been very well as yet; if we
can by any means get wood, we shall not let our fires go out, but it is
at a price indeed; from four dollars it has risen to nine. Some say it
will fall, but there must be more industry than is to be found here to
bring half enough to the market for the consumption of the inhabitants.”
The Hon. John Cotton Smith, a member of Congress from Connecticut,
describing Washington as it appeared to him on his arrival there, wrote
as follows:
“Our approach to the city was accompanied with sensations not easily
described. One wing of the Capitol only had been erected, which, with
the President’s House, a mile distant from it, both constructed with
white sandstone, were striking objects in dismal contrast with the scene
around them. Instead of recognizing the avenues and streets portrayed on
the plan of the city, not one was visible unless we except a road, with
two buildings on each side of it, called the New Jersey Avenue. The
Pennsylvania, leading as laid down on paper, from the Capitol to the
Presidential mansion, was then nearly the whole distance a deep morass,
covered with alder bushes, which were cut through the width of the
intended Avenue the then ensuing winter.... The roads in every direction
were muddy and unimproved; a sidewalk was attempted in one instance by a
covering formed of the chips of the stones which had been hewed for the
Capitol. It extended but a little way, and was of little value, for in
dry weather the sharp fragments cut our shoes, and in wet weather
covered them with white mortar; in short, it was a new settlement. The
houses, with two or three exceptions, had been very recently erected,
and the operation greatly hurried in view of the approaching transfer of
the national government. A laughable desire was manifested by what few
citizens and residents there were, to render our condition as pleasant
as circumstances would permit. Notwithstanding the unfavorable aspect
which Washington presented on our arrival, I cannot sufficiently express
my admiration of its local position. From the Capitol you have a
distinct view of its fine, undulating surface, situated at the
confluence of the Potomac and its Eastern Branch, the wide expanse of
that majestic river to the bend at Mount Vernon, the cities of
Alexandria and Georgetown, and the cultivated fields and blue hills of
Maryland and Virginia on either side of the river, the whole
constituting a prospect of surpassing beauty and grandeur. The city has
also the inestimable advantage of delightful water, in many instances
flowing from copious springs, and always attainable by digging to a
moderate depth.
“Some portions of the city are forty miles from Baltimore. The situation
is indeed beautiful and pleasant.
“The President’s house was built to be looked at by visitors and
strangers, and will render its occupants an object of ridicule with some
and of pity with others. It must be cold and damp in winter, and cannot
be kept in tolerable order without a regiment of servants. There are but
few houses at any one place, and most of them small, miserable huts,
which present an awful contrast to the public buildings. The people are
poor, and as far as I can judge, they live like fishes, by eating each
other.”
The first New Year’s reception at the White House was held by President
Adams in 1801. The house was only partially furnished, and Mrs. Adams
used the oval room up-stairs, now the library, as a drawing-room. The
formal etiquette established by Mrs. Washington at New York and
Philadelphia was kept up in the wilderness-city by Mrs. Adams.
At this time the health of Mrs. Adams, which had never been very firm,
began decidedly to fail. Her residence at Philadelphia had not been
favorable, as it had subjected her to the attack of an intermittent
fever, from the effects of which she was never afterward perfectly free.
The desire to enjoy the bracing air of her native climate, as well as to
keep together the private property of her husband, upon which she early
foresaw that he would be obliged to rely for their support in their last
years, prompted her to reside much of her time at Quincy.
Thus closed Mrs. Adams’ life in Washington, of which she has given a
picture in her letter to her daughter; and spring found her once more in
her Massachusetts home, recuperating her failing health. She lived in
Washington only four months—and yet she is inseparably connected with
it. She was mistress of the White House less than half a year, but she
stamped it with her individuality, and none have lived there since who
have not looked upon her as the model and guide. It is not asserting too
much, to observe that the first occupant of that historic house stands
without a rival, and receives a meed of praise awarded to no other
American woman.
In the midst of public or private troubles, the buoyant spirit of Mrs.
Adams never forsook her. “I am a mortal enemy,” she wrote upon one
occasion to her husband, “to anything but a cheerful countenance and a
merry heart, which Solomon tells us does good like a medicine.” “This
spirit,” says her son, “contributed greatly to lift up his heart, when
surrounded by difficulties and dangers, exposed to open hostility, and
secret detraction, and resisting a torrent of invective, such as it may
well be doubted whether any other individual in public station in the
United States has ever tried to stem. It was this spirit which soothed
his wounded feelings when the country, which he had served in the full
consciousness of the perfect honesty of his motives, threw him off, and
signified its preference for other statesmen. There are oftener, even in
this life, more compensations for the severest of the troubles that
afflict mankind, than we are apt to think.”
The sacrifices made by Mrs. Adams during the long era of war,
pestilence, and famine, deserves and should receive from a nation’s
gratitude a monument as high and massive as her illustrious husband’s.
Let it be reared in the hearts of the women of America, who may proudly
claim her as a model, and let her fame be transmitted to remotest
posterity—the “Portia” of the rebellious provinces.
Statues and monuments belong rather to a bygone than a present time, and
are indicative of a less degree of culture than we of this century
boast. The pages of history are the truest, safest sarcophagi of
greatness, and embalm in their records the lives of the master-workers.
Not in marble or bronze be her memory perpetuated, for we need no such
hieroglyphics in this country of free schools. Place her history in the
libraries of America, and the children of freedom will live over her
deeds. To the crumbling monarchies of Europe on their way to
dissolution, it may be necessary to erect statues of past greatness,
that some shadow of their nothingness may remain as warnings; but the
men and women of revolutionary memory are become a part and parcel of
this government, whose very existence must be wiped from the face of the
earth ere one jot or tittle of their fame is lost.
In viewing the character of Mrs. Adams, as it looms up in the pages of
the past, we can but regret that she occupied no more enlarged sphere.
The woman who could reply as she did to the question, (“Had you known
that Mr. Adams would have remained so long abroad, would you have
consented that he should have gone?”)—could have filled any position in
civil life. “If I had known,” she replied, after a moment’s hesitation,
“that Mr. Adams could have effected what he has done, I would not only
have submitted to the absence I have endured, painful as it has been,
but I would not have opposed it, even though three more years should be
added to the number. I feel a pleasure in being able to sacrifice my
selfish passions to the general good, and in imitating the example which
has taught me to consider myself and family but as the small dust of the
balance, when compared with the great community.”
With the marked characteristics which made her determined and resolute,
she could have occupied any post of honor requiring a strong mind and
clear perceptions of right; cut off, as was her sex, from participation
in the struggle around her; confined by custom to the lonely and
wearisome monotony of her country home, she nevertheless stamped her
character upon the hearts of her countrymen, and enrolled her name among
its workers. Had she been called into any of the departments of State,
or required to fill any place of trust, hers would have been an enviable
name; even as it is, she occupies the foreground of the Revolutionary
history, and so powerful were the energies of her soul, that biographers
and historians have deemed it worth their while to deny, in lengthy
terms, her influence over her husband, and exert every argument to prove
that she in no way controlled his actions. The opinions of men differ on
this point, and the students of American biographies decide the
questions from their own stand-points. Yet who will not venture to
assert, that with the culture bestowed upon her which many men received,
she would have towered high above them in their pride and selfishness!
Controlled by the usages of society, she could only live in her
imagination, and impress upon her children the great ideas that were
otherwise doomed to fritter away uselessly in her brain. Indifferent to
the charms of fashionable life, deprived of the luxuries which too often
enervate and render worthless the capacities of woman, she was as
independent and self-supporting in her actions, as were the inspirations
of her mind; and through good and evil report, conduced by her example
to place that reliance in her country’s success which in a great measure
secured its independence. Her character was one of undeviating fairness
and frank truthfulness, free from affectation and vanity.
From the year 1801 down to the day of her death, a period of seventeen
years, she lived uninterruptedly at Quincy. The old age of Mrs. Adams
was not one of grief and repining, of clouds and darkness; her
cheerfulness continued with the full possession of her faculties to the
last, and her sunny spirit enlivened the small social circle around her,
brightened the solitary hours of her husband, and spread the influence
of its example over the town where she lived. “Yesterday,” she writes,
to a granddaughter, on the 26th of October, 1814, “completes half a
century since I entered the marriage state, then just your age. I have
great cause of thankfulness that I have lived so long and enjoyed so
large a portion of happiness as has been my lot. The greatest source of
unhappiness I have known, in that period, has arisen from the long and
cruel separations which I was called, in a time of war, and with a young
family around me, to submit to.”
The appointment of her eldest son as Minister to Great Britain, by
President Madison, was a life-long satisfaction to her; and the
testimony President Monroe gave her of his worth, by making him his
Secretary of State, was the crowning joy of her life. Had she been
spared a few years longer, she would have enjoyed seeing him hold the
position his father had occupied before him. Mrs. Adams lost three of
her children: a daughter in infancy; a son grown to manhood, who died in
1800; and in 1813 her only remaining daughter, Abigail, the wife of
Colonel William S. Smith.
The warmest feelings of friendship had existed between Mr. Jefferson and
herself until a difference in political sentiments, developed during the
administration of President Washington, disturbed the social relations
existing. “Both Mr. Adams and Mr. Jefferson tried as hard as men could
do, to resist the natural effect upon them of their antagonist
positions. They strove each in turn, to stem the proscriptive fury of
the parties to which they belonged, and that with equally bad success.
“Mrs. Adams felt as women only feel, what she regarded as the ungenerous
conduct of Mr. Jefferson towards her husband during the latter part of
his public life, and when she retired from Washington, notwithstanding
the kindest professions from his mouth were yet ringing in her ears, all
communication between the parties ceased. Still, there remained on both
sides, pleasant reminiscences to soften the irritation that had taken
place, and to open a way for reconciliation whenever circumstances
should present a suitable opportunity.”
The little daughter of Mr. Jefferson, in whom Mrs. Adams had taken so
much interest in 1787, had in the interval grown into a woman, and had
been married to Mr. Eppes of Virginia. In 1804 she ceased to be numbered
among the living, and almost against her own judgment Mrs. Adams wrote
to him. He seemed to be much affected by this testimony of her sympathy,
and replied, not confining himself to the subject-matter of her letter,
and added a request to know her reasons for the estrangement that had
occurred. Without the knowledge of her husband she replied to him, but
he at first did not choose to believe her assertion. Fortunately, the
original endorsement, made in the handwriting of letters retained by
herself, will serve to put this matter beyond question. Her last letter
to him was as follows:
“QUINCY, _25th October, 1804_.
“SIR: Sickness for three weeks past has prevented my acknowledging the
receipt of your letter of Sept. 11th. When I first addressed you, I
little thought of entering into a correspondence with you upon subjects
of a political nature. I will not regret it, as it has led to some
elucidations, and brought on some explanations, which place in a more
favorable light occurrences which had wounded me.
“Having once entertained for you a respect and esteem, founded upon the
character of an affectionate parent, a kind master, a candid and
benevolent friend, I could not suffer different political opinions to
obliterate them from my mind. I felt the truth of the observation, that
the heart is long, very long in receiving the conviction that is forced
upon it by reason. It was not until circumstances occurred to place you
in the light of a rewarder and encourager of a libeler, whom you could
not but detest and despise, that I withdrew the esteem I had long
entertained for you. Nor can you wonder, Sir, that I should consider as
a personal unkindness, the instance I have mentioned. I am pleased to
find that which respected my son altogether unfounded. He was, as you
conjecture, appointed a commissioner of bankruptcy, together with Judge
Dawes, and continued to serve in it with perfect satisfaction to all
parties (at least I never heard the contrary), until _superseded_ by the
appointment of others. The idea suggested that no one was in office, and
consequently no removal could take place, I cannot consider in any other
light than what the gentlemen of the law would term a quibble—as such I
pass it. Judge Dawes was continued or reappointed, which placed Mr.
Adams in a more conspicuous light as the object of personal resentment.
Nor could I, upon this occasion, refrain calling to mind the last visit
you made me at Washington, when in the course of conversation you
assured me, that if it should lay in your power at any time to serve me
or my family, nothing would give you more pleasure. With respect to the
office, it was a small object, but the disposition of the remover was
considered by me as the barbed arrow. This, however, by your
declaration, is withdrawn from my mind. With the public it will remain.
And here, Sir, may I be allowed to pause, and ask whether, in your
ardent desire to rectify the mistakes and abuses, as you may term them,
of the former administrations, you may not be led into measures still
more fatal to the constitution, and more derogatory to your honor and
independence of character? I know, from the observations which I have
made, that there is not a more difficult part devolves upon a chief
magistrate, nor one which subjects him to more reproach and censure,
than the appointments to office. And all the patronage which this
enviable power gives him is but a poor compensation for the
responsibility to which it subjects him. It would be well, however, to
weigh and consider characters, as it respects their moral worth and
integrity. He who is not true to himself, nor just to others, seeks an
office for the benefit of himself, unmindful of that of his country. I
cannot accord with you in opinion that the Constitution ever meant to
withhold from the National Government the power of self-defence; or that
it could be considered an infringement of the liberty of the press, to
punish the licentiousness of it. Time must determine and posterity will
judge with more candor and impartiality, I hope, than the conflicting
parties of our day, what measures have best promoted the happiness of
the people; and what raised them from a state of depression and
degradation to wealth, honor, and reputation; what has made them
affluent at home and respected abroad; and to whomsoever the tribute is
due, to them may it be given. I will not further intrude upon your time;
but close this correspondence by my wishes that you may be directed to
that path which may terminate in the prosperity and happiness of the
people over whom you are placed, by administering the government with
justice and impartiality; and be assured, Sir, no one will more rejoice
in your success than
“ABIGAIL ADAMS.”
(MEMORANDUM subjoined to the copy of this letter, in the handwriting of
Mr. Adams.)
“QUINCY, _19th November, 1804_.
“The whole of this correspondence was begun and conducted without my
knowledge or suspicion. Last evening and this morning, at the desire of
Mrs. Adams, I read the whole. I have no remarks to make upon it, at this
time and in this place.
“J. ADAMS.”
“A new and strong tie was beginning indeed to bind the stately old men
together. They were speedily becoming the last of the signers of the
Declaration of Independence—the last of the great actors and leaders of
1776. Their common and dearly-loved friend Rush had died in April, 1813,
after a brief illness.” Mr. Jefferson wrote to Mr. Adams of this
occurrence, and said: “Another of our friends of seventy-six is gone, my
dear sir, another of the co-signers of the independence of our country.
I believe we are under half a dozen at present; I mean the signers of
the Declaration. Yourself, Gerry, Carroll and myself, are all I know to
be living.”
Appended to a letter from Adams to Jefferson, dated July 15th, 1813, we
find the following:
“I have been looking for some time for a space in my good husband’s
letters to add the regards of an old friend, which are still cherished
and preserved through all the changes and vicissitudes which have taken
place since we first became acquainted, and will, I trust, remain as
long as
“A. ADAMS.”
“Neither Mrs. Adams nor her husband ever met Mr. Jefferson again, but
she had the opportunity, and eagerly availed herself of it, to bestow
kindly and assiduous attentions on some of his family.
“She lost none of the imposing features of her character in the decline
of life. An observing and intelligent gentleman who was a guest at
Quincy within a year or two of her death, has given us a description of
his visit. Mr. Adams shook as if palsied; but the mind and the heart
were evidently sound. His spirits seemed as elastic as a boy’s. He
joked, laughed heartily, and talked about everybody and everything, past
and present, with the most complete _abandon_. He seemed to our highly
educated informant to be a vast encyclopædia of written and unwritten
knowledge. It gushed out on every possible topic, but was mingled with
lively anecdotes and sallies, and he exhibited a carelessness in his
language which suggested anything but pedantry or an attempt at ‘fine
talking.’ In short, the brave old man was as delightful as he was
commanding in conversation. While the guest was deeply enjoying this
interview, an aged and stately female entered the apartment, and he was
introduced to Mrs. Adams. A cap of exquisite lace surrounded features
still exhibiting intellect and energy, though they did not wear the
appearance of ever having been beautiful. Her dress was snowy white, and
there was that immaculate neatness in her appearance which gives to age
almost the sweetness of youth. With less warmth of manner and
sociableness than Mr. Adams, she was sufficiently gracious, and her
occasional remarks betrayed intellectual vigor and strong sense. The
guest went away feeling that he never again should behold such living
specimens of the ‘great of old.’”
Mrs. Adams died of an attack of fever, the 28th of October, 1818, at the
advanced age of seventy-four years. “To learning,” says her grandson,
“in the ordinary sense of that term, Mrs. Adams could make no claim. Her
reading had been extensive in the lighter departments of literature, and
she was well acquainted with the poets in her own language, but it went
no further. It is the soul, shining through the words, that gives them
their great attraction; the spirit ever equal to the occasion, whether a
great or a small one; a spirit, inquisitive and earnest in the little
details of life, as when she was in France and England; playful, when
she describes daily duties, but rising to the call when the roar of
cannon is in her ears—or when she reproves her husband for not knowing
her better than to think her a coward and to fear telling her bad news.”
“The obsequies of Mrs. Adams were attended by a great concourse of
people, who voluntarily came to pay this last tribute to her memory.
Several brief but beautiful notices of her appeared in the newspapers of
the day, and a sermon was preached by the late Rev. Dr. Kirkland, then
President of Harvard University, which closed with a delicate and
affecting testimony to her worth. ‘Ye will seek to mourn, bereaved
friends,’ it says, ‘as becomes Christians, in a manner worthy of the
person you lament. You do then bless the Giver of Life that the course
of your endeared and honored friend was so long and so bright; that she
entered so fully into the spirit of those injunctions which we have
explained, and was a minister of blessings to all within her influence.
You are soothed to reflect that she was sensible of the many tokens of
divine goodness which marked her lot; that she received the good of her
existence with a cheerful and grateful heart; that, when called to weep,
she bore adversity with an equal mind; that she used the world as not
abusing it to excess, improving well her time, talents and
opportunities, and though desired longer in this world, was fitted for a
better happiness than this world can give.’”
Mr. Jefferson, despite the feeling that he had not been understood by
Mrs. Adams as he thought he deserved, never lost any part of the
profound respect and friendship he entertained for her, and soon as the
news of her death reached him he wrote as follows to her husband: