The True George Washington | Page 5

her
own. I lament accordingly that your letter, which conveyed the first
hint of this matter, did not come to my hands sooner; but I request, in
pointed terms, if the matter is now in agitation in your Assembly, that

all proceedings on it may be stopped, or in case of a decision in her
favor, that it may be done away and repealed at my request."
Still greater mortification was in store for him, when he was told that
she was borrowing and accepting gifts from her neighbors, and learned
"on good authority that she is, upon all occasions and in all companies,
complaining ... of her wants and difficulties; and if not in direct terms,
at least by strong innuendoes, endeavors to excite a belief that times are
much altered, &c., &c., which not only makes her appear in an
unfavorable point of view, but those also who are connected with her."
To save her feelings he did not express the "pain" he felt to her, but he
wrote a brother asking him to ascertain if there was the slightest basis
in her complaints, and "see what is necessary to make her comfortable,"
for "while I have anything I will part with it to make her so;" but
begging him "at the same time ... to represent to her in delicate terms,
the impropriety of her complaints, and acceptance of favors, even when
they are voluntarily offered, from any but relations." Though he did not
"touch upon this subject in a letter to her," he was enough fretted to end
the renting of her plantation, not because "I mean ... to withhold any aid
or support I can give from you; for whilst I have a shilling left, you
shall have part," but because "what I shall then give, I shall have credit
for," and not be "viewed as a delinquent, and considered perhaps by the
world as [an] unjust and undutiful son."
In the last years of her life a cancer developed, which she refused to
have "dressed," and over which, as her doctor wrote Washington, the
"Old Lady" and he had "a small battle every day." Once Washington
was summoned by an express to her bedside "to bid, as I was prepared
to expect, the last adieu to an honored parent," but it was a false alarm.
Her health was so bad, however, that just before he started to New
York to be inaugurated he rode to Fredericksburg, "and took a final
leave of my mother, never expecting to see her more," a surmise that
proved correct.
Only Elizabeth--or "Betty"--of Washington's sisters grew to
womanhood, and it is said that she was so strikingly like her brother
that, disguised with a long cloak and a military hat, the difference
between them was scarcely detectable. She married Fielding Lewis, and
lived at "Kenmore House" on the Rappahannock, where Washington
spent many a night, as did the Lewises at Mount Vernon. During the

Revolution, while visiting there, she wrote her brother, "Oh, when will
that day arrive when we shall meet again. Trust in the lord it will be
soon,--till when, you have the prayers and kind wishes for your health
and happiness of your loving and sincerely affectionate sister." Her
husband died "much indebted," and from that time her brother gave her
occasional sums of money, and helped her in other ways.
Her eldest son followed in his father's footsteps, and displeased
Washington with requests for loans. He angered him still more by
conduct concerning which Washington wrote to him as follows:
"Sir, Your letter of the 11th of Octor. never came to my hands 'till
yesterday. Altho' your disrespectful conduct towards me, in coming
into this country and spending weeks therein without ever coming near
me, entitled you to very little notice or favor from me; yet I consent
that you may get timber from off my Land in Fauquier County to build
a house on your Lott in Rectertown. Having granted this, now let me
ask you what your views were in purchasing a Lott in a place which, I
presume, originated with and will end in two or three Gin shops, which
probably will exist no longer than they serve to ruin the proprietors,
and those who make the most frequent applications to them. I am, &c."
[Illustration: MRS FIELDING LEWIS (BETTY WASHINGTON)]
Other of the Lewis boys pleased him better, and he appointed one an
officer in his own "Life Guard." Of another he wrote, when President,
to his sister, "If your son Howell is living with you, and not usefully
employed in your own affairs, and should incline to spend a few
months with me, as a writer in my office (if he is fit for it) I will allow
him at the rate