of "the unexampled merits
of George Washington towards his country." Washington was much touched
and not a little troubled by this action. He had been willing, as he
said, to give up his cherished privacy and repose in order to forward
the enterprise. He had gone to Maryland even, and worked to engage
that State in the scheme, but he could not bear the idea of taking
money for what he regarded as part of a great public policy. "I would
wish," he said, "that every individual who may hear that it was a
favorite plan of mine may know also that I had no other motive for
promoting it than the advantage of which I conceived it would be
productive to the Union, and to this State in particular, by cementing
the eastern and western territory together, at the same time that it
will give vigor and increase to our commerce, and be a convenience to
our citizens."

"How would this matter be viewed, then, by the eye of the world, and
what would be the opinion of it, when it comes to be related that
George Washington has received twenty thousand dollars and five
thousand pounds sterling of the public money as an interest therein?"
He thought it would make him look like a "pensioner or dependent"
to accept this gratuity, and he recoiled from the idea. There is
something entirely frank and human in the way in which he says "George
Washington," instead of using the first pronoun singular. He always
saw facts as they were; he understood the fact called "George
Washington" as perfectly as any other, and although he wanted
retirement and privacy, he had no mock modesty in estimating his own
place in the world. At the same time, while he wished to be rid of the
kindly gift, he shrank from putting on what he called the appearance
of "ostentatious disinterestedness" by refusing it. Finally he took
the stock and endowed two charity schools with the dividends. The
scheme turned out successfully, and the work still endures, like the
early surveys and various other things of a very different kind to
which Washington put his hand. In the greater forces which were
presently set in motion for the preservation of the future empire,
the inland navigation, started in Virginia, dropped out of sight, and
became merely one of the rills which fed the mighty river. But it was
the only really practical movement possible at the precise moment when
it was begun, and it was characteristic of its author, who always
found, even in the most discouraging conditions