THE FOUNDING OF THE NATIONAL CAPITAL 24I 



and building a block of houses near Greenleaf's Point, in south- 

 west Washington, which are still standing. He also built the 

 three large mansions in one block, at New Jersey Avenue and 

 C Street, southeast, so long occupied by the Coast Survey, and 

 which is now the Hotel Varnum. He married the beautiful 

 Miss Elizabeth Parke Custis, a grand-daughter of Mrs. Martha 

 Washington, but separated from her after some years of married 

 life. The late Dr. Brodhead, who was his neighbor for many 

 years, told me that Mr. Law had a very slow, imperturbable 

 utterance. One morning, while sitting at breakfast, his negro 

 waiter announced to him — " Massa Thomas, Missus Law died 

 last night." " The-hell-she-did ? — pass-the-po-ta-toes," was 

 his only reply. 



The English traveller, Thomas Twining, who had been, like 

 Mr. Law, an East India resident, visited him at Washington in 

 1796, and remarked upon the seclusion in which he had chosen 

 to bury his distinguished talents. " I could not but be surprised," 

 said he, " at the plan of life he had chosen. The clearing of 

 ground, and building of small houses, amongst the woods of the 

 Potomac" seemed to him a most uncongenial occupation for such 

 a man as Law. 



The Duke de la Rochefoucauld-Liancourt stayed with Law 

 during his visit to ' Federal City,' and, says he — " I could not 

 felicitate Mr. Law on the speculation which induced him to pur- 

 chase lots in the new city, and thought he might have niade a 

 more prudent and fortunate use of his great property." " His 

 fortune," he adds, " is superior to the greatest fortunes in Amer- 

 ica, and he might have lived on his own revenues with splen- 

 dor. He has wilfully plunged himself into an abyss of cares, 

 and all the contentions of this distracted city, which not only 

 prevent the enjoyment of his fortune, but even endanger it." 



Mr. Law was an eccentric specimen of the wealthy Indian na- 

 bob, who appeared to others marvellously out of place in the crude 

 wilderness of Washington. His leading qualities were obsti- 

 nacy and independence. The more money he sunk in building 

 fine residences in places where nobody wanted to reside, the 

 more he resolved to have his own way. His losses in real es- 

 tate were enormous, but he lived luxuriously, entertaining Eng- 



