ell."

"You are in the way of duty, George, and I have no desire to interpose,"
his mother answered. "My race is almost run, and I shall never see you
again in the flesh."

"I hope we shall meet again; though at your great age, and with such a
serious disease upon you, the end cannot be far away," replied the son.

Mrs. Washington was then eighty-three years of age, and was suffering
from a cancer in the breast.

"Yes, I am old and feeble, and growing more so every day," continued his
mother; "and I wait the summons of the Master without fear or anxiety."

Pausing a moment, as if to control emotion, she added, "Go, George, and
fulfil the high destiny to which Providence calls you; and may God
continue to guide and bless you!"

At this point let Mr. Custis speak:

"Washington was deeply affected. His head rested upon the shoulder of
his parent, whose aged arm feebly, yet fondly, encircled his neck. That
brow, on which fame had wreathed the purest laurel virtue ever gave to
created man, relaxed from its lofty bearing. That look, which would have
awed a Roman senate in its Fabrician day, was bent in filial tenderness
upon the time-worn features of the aged matron. He wept. A thousand
recollections crowded upon his mind, as memory, retracing scenes long
passed, carried him back to the maternal mansion and the days of
juvenility, where he beheld that mother, whose care, education, and
discipline caused him to reach the topmost height of laudable ambition.
Yet, how were his glories forgotten while he gazed upon her whom, wasted
by time and malady, he should part with to meet no more!"

Washington never saw his mother again. She died Aug. 25, 1789. Her last
days were characterized by that cheerful resignation to the divine will
for which she was ever distinguished, and she passed away in the
triumphs of Christian faith.

Her remains were laid in the burial ground of Fredericksburg, in a spot
which she selected, because it was situated near the place where she was
wont to retire for meditation and prayer. For many years her grave was
unmarked by slab or monument; but in 1833, Silas E. Barrows, Esq., of
New York City, undertook the erection of a monument at his own expense.

On the seventh day of May of that year, President Jackson laid the
corner-stone in the presence of a great concourse of people. It was
estimated that more than fifteen thousand persons assembled to honor the
dead.

The plan of the monument was p