Till Lately This Place Was Owned And Inhabited By One Of The Family, A Washington, Descended From A Brother Of The General's; But It Has Now Become The Property Of The Country, Under The Auspices Of Mr. Everett, By Whose Exertions Was Raised The Money With Which It Was Purchased.

It is a long house, of two stories, built, I think, chiefly of wood, with a veranda, or rather long portico, attached to the front, which looks upon the river.

There are two wings, or sets of outhouses, containing the kitchen and servants' rooms, which were joined by open wooden verandas to the main building; but one of these verandas has gone, under the influence of years. By these a semicircular sweep is formed before the front door, which opens away from the river, and toward the old prim gardens, in which, we were told, General Washington used to take much delight. There is nothing very special about the house. Indeed, as a house, it would now be found comfortless and inconvenient. But the ground falls well down to the river, and the timber, if not fine, is plentiful and picturesque. The chief interest of the place, however, is in the tomb of Washington and his wife. It must be understood that it was a common practice throughout the States to make a family burying-ground in any secluded spot on the family property. I have not unfrequently come across these in my rambles, and in Virginia I have encountered small, unpretending gravestones under a shady elm, dated as lately as eight or ten years back. At Mount Vernon there is now a cemetery of the Washington family; and there, in an open vault - a vault open, but guarded by iron grating - is the great man's tomb, and by his side the tomb of Martha his wife. As I stood there alone, with no one by to irritate me by assertions of the man's absolute supremacy, I acknowledged that I had come to the final resting-place of a great and good man, - of a man whose patriotism was, I believe, an honest feeling, untinged by any personal ambition of a selfish nature. That he was pre-eminently a successful man may have been due chiefly to the excellence of his cause, and the blood and character of the people who put him forward as their right arm in their contest; but that he did not mar that success by arrogance, or destroy the brightness of his own name by personal aggrandizement, is due to a noble nature and to the calm individual excellence of the man.

Considering the circumstances and history of the place, the position of Mount Vernon, as I saw it, was very remarkable. It lay exactly between the lines of the two armies. The pickets of the Northern army had been extended beyond it, not improbably with the express intention of keeping a spot so hallowed within the power of the Northern government. But since the war began it had been in the hands of the seceders.

Enter page number Go  Previous Next
Page 19 of 275
Words from 9238 to 9748 of 142339