The Salt Lake tribune. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1890-current, 1913-02-19
WOODROW Will SONS
~ Life Of Washington -
rom Page Eyal
Life of Washington
Continued From Page Five.)

of their blood and eight years faithful
services"
Washington knew. nevertheless. how
black a danger lurked among these dis
trcssed men; did not fall to speak plain
ly of II TO the congress, and breathed
freely again only when the soldiers Just
demands had at last in some measure
been met by at any rate the proper leg
islation.
He grew weary with longing for peace.
when the work seemed done and his
thoughts had leisure to turn towards his
home again. But once in all the length
ened days of fghting had he seen Mount
Vernon. He had turned aside TO spend
a night or two there on his way to York
town. and ne had seen the loved place
again for little after the victory was
Won. Now, amidst profitless days at
Ncwburgh. or In counsel with the com
mittees OF the congress- upon business
stood IL were In a sort OF paralysis,
waiting upon the intermlnable confer
ences OF the three powers who haggled
over deflnitlvc terms of peace at Paris,
home seemed to him. in his weariness
more TO be desired than ever before, Pri-
vate sriefs had stricken him at the very
moment OF his triumph.
Scarcely had the victory at Yorktown
been celebrated when he was called (No-
vember. 17S) to the deathbed OF Jack
Custis. his wayward but dearly loved
stepson, and had there to endure the sight
of his wife's grief and the young widow 3
hopeless sorrow added 10 his own. Tho
two youngest children he claimed for
himself, with that wlstful fatherly long
ing that had always marked him, and
Mount Vernon seemed to him more like
a haven than ever. where 10 seek rest
and solace- The two years he had yet
TO wait may well have added a touch OF
their own to what strangers deemed his
sternness.
TOOK PROMPT ACTION.
He had seldom seemed so stern. in
deed. as in one incident OF those trying
months. An officer OF the American
army had been taken in a skirmish. and
the English had permitted brutal COM
pany OF loyalsts. under one Capital Lip
pincott. to take him from his prison in
New York and wantonly hang him In
broad daylight on the Nights near Mid
dletown.
Washington at once notified the Brit
ish commander that unless the mur-
derers were delivered up to be punished
a British officer would be chosen by lot
their stead; and. when reparation was
withheld proceeded without hesitation to
carry his threat into execution; The lot
fell upon Captain Charles Asgill, an en-
great English family. Lady Asgill, the
lads mother. did not stop short OF NOV
ing the very French court Itself to In
tervene to save her son, and at last the
congress counseled his release, the Eng
lish commander having diSavowed the act
of the murderers In whose place he was
to suffer. and Washington himself hav-
Ing asked TO be directed what he should
do.
Captain AsglI has been released"
Washington wrote to Nergennes, In an
swcr to the great minister's intercession,
81 have no right to assume any particu
lar merit from the lenicnt manner In
which this disaSreeable affair has ternl-
mated. But ! beg you to believe. sir,
that most sincerely rejoice, not only be
cause your humane intentions are grat-
fed but bacause the event accOrdS with
the wishes OF his most Christian majes-
ty."
NEXORABLE LEADER.
II lifted q great weight from his heart
to have the innocent boy go unhurt from
his hands, and he wrote almost tenderly
TO him in acquainting him with his re-
lease; but II was OF his simple nature
to have sent the lad 10 the gallows.
stand as they were at the first He was
inexorablc TO check perfidy and vindi-
cate the just rules OF war. Men were re-
minded. while The affair pended, OF w
hanging of Andre. Arnold's British con-
federate In treason. and how pitiless the
commander-in- chief had seemed in send
ing the frank, accomplished. lovaoie gen
tleman to his dIsSraccful death, Ike any
common spy. granting him not even the
favor TO De shot. like a soldier. 1t seemed
hard 10 learn the inlleNible lines upon
which that consistent mind worked. as if
II had gone to school to fate.
But no one deemed him hard or stern.
or so much as n thought more or less
than human, when at last the british had
withdrawn from New York and he stood