or chance he never would have met her, that one of the
greatest disasters in history would have been averted.

Betsey, who had not been well for some time, went to the northern
forests of her old home to strive for "spring" and colour. She took the
children with her, and Hamilton, who hated to live alone, filled his
deserted rooms with Troup, Fish, and Baron Steuben, whose claims he had
been pressing upon Congress for years, practically supporting him
meanwhile. The old soldier felt keenly the ingratitude of the country he
had served, but in time it made him ample compensation; meanwhile the
devotion of a few friends, and the lionizing of society, helped him to
bear his lot with considerable fortitude. He spent hours in the nursery
of the little Hamiltons, and was frequently seen in the Broadway with
one in his arms and the other three attached to his person.

All the talk was of Washington and the first administration, Hamilton
having carried his point in Congress that New York should be the
temporary seat of government; there was jealousy and wrangling over
this, as over most other matters involving state pride, but Hamilton
believed that should the prize fall to Philadelphia, she would not
relinquish it as lightly as New York, which geographically was the more
unfit for a permanent gathering, and that the inconvenience to which
most of the members, in those days of difficult travel over a vast area,
would be subjected, would force them the sooner to agree upon a central
and commonly agreeable locality,--one, moreover, which would not meet
with the violent opposition of New York. Madison, who had been in favour
of Philadelphia, finally acknowledged Hamilton's sagacity and gave him
his influence and vote.

That point settled, all eyes were turned to Mount Vernon. The masses
took for granted that Washington would respond to every call of duty the
public chose to make, and it was inconceivable that anyone else should
fill the first term of that great executive experiment. The universal
confidence in Washington and belief that he was to guide the
Constitution over the more critical of its shoals, had operated more
than any other factor in the ratification of that adventurous
instrument. It was a point upon which Hamilton had harped continually.
That a whole country should turn, as a matter of course, to a man whom
they revered for his virtues rather than for any brilliant parts he may
have effectually hidden within his