in the cause of liberty
and your country, that it might be crowned with success. But the ways of
Providence are inscrutable, and mortals must submit. I pray you to
believe that at all times and under any circumstances it would make me
happy to see you at my last retreat, from which I never expect to be
more than twenty miles again."[1*]

[Footnote 1: _Op. cit_.]

[Footnote 1*: _Writings of George Washington_, ed. Jared Sparks.]

The story of the meeting between Washington and Kosciuszko, of
Kosciuszko's words, "Father, do you recognize your son?" is a myth. They
met neither in Philadelphia nor elsewhere. The above letter is the last
indication of any intercourse between them. Washington at this period
was regarded with no favour by the democracy. Kosciuszko's sympathies
were with the latter and with Jefferson, and he never accepted the
invitation to Washington's home in Mount Vernon.

Yellow fever breaking out in Philadelphia, Kosciuszko went for a time
elsewhere: first to New York, to the beautiful house of his old friend
and commander, Gates, later to New Brunswick, where he stayed with
another friend of the past. General White, in a family circle that
attracted his warm regard. He was still confined to his sofa, and amused
himself by his favourite pastime of drawing and painting, tended by the
ladies of the house with a solicitude which drew from him after he had
gone back to Philadelphia a charming "hospitable roof" letter. I have
been unable to see the original English in which Kosciuszko wrote this
letter, which is given in a privately printed American memoir. I am
therefore obliged to translate it from the Polish version, which is in
its turn a translation into Polish from Kosciuszko's English. We
therefore lose the flavour of Kosciuszko's not wholly correct
manipulation of our language:--

"Madam,

"I cannot rest till I obtain your forgiveness in all its fulness for the
trouble I gave you during my stay in your house. ... Perhaps I was the
cause of depriving you of amusements more suited to your liking and
pleasure, than busying yourself with me. You never went out to pay
visits. You were kind enough to ask me daily what I liked, what I did
not like: all my desires were carried out; all my wishes were
anticipated, to gratify me and to make my stay agreeable. Let me receive
an answer from you, forgiving me, I beg Eliza [her daughter] to
intercede for me. I owe you too great a debt to be able to express it