ers slightly in
immaterial points. Mr. Lawrence says:--

"Among the incidents connected with his (Mr. Gallatin's) earliest
explorations was an interview with General Washington, which he
repeatedly recounted to me. He had previously observed that of all
the inaccessible men he had ever seen, General Washington was the
most so. And this remark he made late in life, after having been
conversant with most of the sovereigns of Europe and their prime
ministers. He said, in connection with his office, he had a cot-bed
in the office of the surveyor of the district when Washington, who
had lands in the neighborhood, and was desirous of effecting
communication between the rivers, came there. Mr. Gallatin's bed
was given up to him,--Gallatin lying on the floor, immediately
below the table at which Washington was writing. Washington was
endeavoring to reduce to paper the calculations of the day.
Gallatin, hearing the statement, came at once to the conclusion,
and, after waiting some time, he himself gave the answer, which
drew from Washington such a look as he never experienced before or
since. On arriving by a slow process at his conclusion, Washington
turned to Gallatin and said, 'You are right, young man.'"

The points of difference between the two accounts of this interview are
of little importance. The look which Washington is said to have given
Mr. Gallatin has its counterpart in that with which he is also said to
have turned upon Gouverneur Morris, when accosted by him familiarly with
a touch on the shoulder. Bartlett, in his recollection of the anecdote,
adds that Washington, about this period, inquired after the forward
young man, and urged him to become his land agent,--an offer which
Gallatin declined.

The winter of 1784-85 was passed in Richmond, in the society of which
town Mr. Gallatin began to find a relief and pleasure he had not yet
experienced in America. At this period the Virginia capital was the
gayest city in the Union, and famous for its abundant hospitality,
rather facile manners, and the liberal tendency of its religious
thought. Gallatin brought no prudishness and no orthodoxy in his
Genevese baggage. One of the last acts of his life was to recognize in
graceful and touching words the kindness he then met with:--

"I was received with that old proverbial Virginia hospitality to
which I know no parallel