The Sun.
London, England, 1869-06-03 00:00:00

W ASHING 7ON CITY.

Perhaps Washington more than any other city
I owes its existence to a theory. It was not like St.
Petersburgh, or like Alexandria, founded by a des-
potic will for good and sufficient reasons (however
unknown to the inhabitants) of situation, of national
requirements, for political considerations, as well as
of commercial advantages. Nor is it even like Pe-
king, which in some respects it resembles. Both
are simply Government towns of Boards, Bureaux,
appointments, examinations, reports ; of office-
seekers and office-holders, free from every taint of
commerce, but the centres, we imagine, of no small
amount of intrigue. Why the site was selected no
one knows, but George Washington himself chose
the spot and planned the city, laying the stone of
the old Capitol in 1793. The commercial centres
of the emancipated colonies were too jealous of
each other, as -a as the case lately in Canada, to per-
mit the selection from any one of them of the seat
of Government, and the plan of a Federal Union
was hostile to the influence which a great city of
that Union could not fail to exert in case the Exe-
cutive were located there. Three thousand and
sixteen acres were set apart for the seat of Govern-
ment on the left bank of the Potomac, between
Rock River and Eastern Branch, 300 miles from the
sea, extending 4i miles north-west and south-east,
and 2i east and south. It will readily be believed
that a poor thinly peopled country extending over
a vast space would not quickly fill up the ample
bounds of a city within which there was no par-
ticular inducement for citizens tosettle without trade
and without manufactures. There were a few great
buildings and monuments, some very long and very
wide streets, and vast spaces yawning between
which induced the Portuguese Minister, Abbe Corea
de Serra, to apply to it a name which has become
famous, " The City of Magnificent Distances." In
1814 the British burnt the Capitol with the Presi-
dent's house and library of Congress, one of those wise
acts which have so much tended to establish the
brotherly feeling known to be cherished between the
kinsmen, Jonathan and Bull. Although it was re-
built shortly after, it was not till 1851 that the grand
edifice now called the Capitol was commenced, the
foundation-stone being laid by President Philli-
more. It stands on 30 acres, in the centre of the
city, elevated so as to command an extensive view,
and enclosed by an iron fence. The building covers
an area of 4i acres ; and the park around, tastefully
laid out, and beautifully kept, forms a delightful
promenade, adorned with fountains and groups
of statuary. From this park branch ten of the
greatest streets ; _Pennsylvania Avenue, which runs
from Rock Creek to Eastern branch, being inter-
sected by it. That avenue is perhaps the broadest
street in the world, at least for a mile and a half of
its four, being 160 feet broad between the Capitol and
the White House, shaded by rows of trees.
avenues are called after the States
in
towsyairvdasniwa,hlih
the
they point ; the lon test being the Pennsylvania,
Massachusetts, and the Virginia. With the excep-
tion of the Avenues, the streets from 70 to 100 feet
in breadth, cross each other at right angles,
n
ning north and sout'a, east and west. The Execu-
tiveru- Mansion is eitunted in the centre of an area of
20 acres, adorned as is the Capitol with gardens
and shrubberies. The .Pennsylvania Avenue leads
straight from the grotteds of the Capitol to those
of the White House, whivh is a two storeyed build:
ing of white freesterue, with lonic pilasters, crowned
with a balustrade, There is a lofty portico on the

north front, and in a small square bele..e, a
bronze statuo, of Jefferson, while in Lafay ette-
73quare adjoining, is an equestrian statue of Jacl-
- The Mansion is 170 feet long and _6
feet deep, but within the same enclosure are some
of the buildings of the State Department. On the
eastern extremity is the Treasury, a stone edi-
fice, 459 feet long and 170 wide, with an imposing
colonade of 42 lonic columns. In the north-west
corner of the square is the War Office, and west of it
is the Navy Department. The Patent Office is a
magnificent building of stone, containing models of
every machine patented in the United States, as well
as a valuable collection of objects of natural history.
The General Post Office is of white marble, in the
Corinthian Order, 204 feet by 102, three storeys
high. The number of the Executive Luildings
is constantly increasing, and the great addition to
the business of Government necessitates a consider-
able public expenditure in this way, which tends
rapidly to add to the magnitude and imposing
nature of these piles. The City Hall, the Hospital,
and Gaol are near, and on the other side of the
Capitol, and not far from the Navy-yard, are the
barracks. The Capitol is of marble, also in the
Corinthian style, presenting a facade of 751 feet,
with handsome portico and lofty dome. Its Ro-
tunda is 95 feet in diameter and 145 feet high,
from which a splendid view of the city and sur-
rounding country is obtained. The ground of the
city is undulating, with an amphitheatre of well
wooded hills. The " river of Swans," navigable up
to but not higher than this city, swells broadly
out, and dotted about are beautiful sites for villas
and country seats. Beyond Rock Creek the lofty
heights of Georgetown overlook the city, and there
these villas are clustered. Adjoining Reservation
No. 1, extending from the White House down to the
river is a wide space; across a creek, called-The-Mall,
whereon stand two buildings of great interest, the
Washington Monument and the Smithsonian In-
stitute. Nothing yet built exceeds in height
the Washington Monument, for from a circu-
lar colonnaded base, 250 feet in diameter and
100 feet high, springs an obelisk 70 feet thick
and 500 feet high, making a total of 600 feet,
being 100 higher than St. Peter's at Rome. Thirty
massive columns surround the base, which is sur-
mounted by an entablature and balustrade, and in
the centre is the tomb of Washington, while oppo-
site to the entrance is his statue. One of the most
interesting buildings of Washington is the Smith-
sonian Institute, surrounded by beautiful gardens.
It arose from the gift of an Englishman who be-
stowed an estate he inherited from the first Duke
of Northumberland, his father, to found at Wash-
ington an establishment for the increase and diffu-
sion of knowledge among men. His mother was the
heiress of the Ilungerfords of Audley, and the donor's
words were—" This (the best blood of England)
avails me nothing ; the man of science is of no
country; the world is his country, and all men his
countrymen." It is of red sandstone, in the Roman
style, 450 feet long, and 140 wide, with 9 towers
varying in height from 75 to 150 feet. Its lecture-
room can contain 2,000 persons, and its library
100,000 volumes. All this space it will require, for
the number of its books, already large, is rapidly
increasing. There is a president and twelve
professors, including those of the National Medical
College, under the same corporation. The bequest
on which it was founded amounted to £lOO,OOO.
Greenleafs Point is at the junction of the Potomac
and Eastern Branch, and there stand the Arsenal
and the Penitentiary. Almost at the other end of
the town, towards Rock Creek, but on the river,
is the National Observatory, ranking only after
St. Petersburgh anid.Greenwich, and from-i-t- Ame-
rican geographers take their longitude. Up the
Eastern Branch, on the other side from Greenleafs
Point, is the Navy-Yard, while higher up still is a
reservation, whereon is the Poor-house, Asylum-
square, and Marine Hospital-square. The Potomac
is crossed by Long Bridge, which connects Jackson
City and Maryland-avenue, leading up to the Capi-
tol. From Jackson city commences the Washington
and Alexandria Railroad. The finest Church is an
Episcopalian edifice called Trinity, on Third Street,
but there are many other handsome and elaborate
structures. The bequests and gifts of citizens
greatly help the Government expenditure in de-
corating and adding to the attractions of Washing-
ton. Scarcely a fortnight has elapsed since Mr.
V. 11. Corcoran, a rich retired banker of that city,
executed a deed transferring his spacious and beauti-
ful building at the corner of Pennsylvania-avenue
and Seventeenth-strut to be held in perpetuity as
an Art Depository and Free Picture Gallery, to.
gether with his large and splendid collection of
pictures and works of art and back rents, which
have accumulated for years, amounting to $lOO,OOO.
The total value of the gift is said to be over
$1,000,000, and it is to be supplemented hereafttr
by an endowment of $300,000. No sooner was
this munificent gift known than Mr. August Bel-
mont, of New York, authorised the trustees ap-
pointed by Mr. Corcoran to choose twelve pic-
tures from his very valuable collection for the
new gallery, to be known as the Belmont contri-
bution. On the heights of Georgetown is a
Convent of the Visitation, and near it the Bishop's
residence. It has an ancient College, and a beautiful
Cemetery called Oakhill. One of the finest struc-
tures is the splendid aqueduct, by which the water
for the city is carried across the Potomac into
Georgetown. All the grand hotels and boarding
houses are on Pennsylvania-avenue. Though the
District of Columbia was established as the perma-
nent seat of Government in 1791, composed of apiece
of Maryland and a piece of Virginia (afterwards
returned), comprised in a square of 10 miles on each
side, or 100 square miles, the town was not begun
till 1793, nor the Government removed from
Philadelphia till 1800. For a long time it was a
city of mud, magnificent distances, and magnifi-
cent pretensions. It was easy to call it the capital
of a nation, but it was hard to make a city of it
at all. The inhabitants were composed of office-
holders, office-seekers, and speculators in " real
estate," and in less than two years after the re-
moval of the Government a proposition was made
by Mr. Sloan, of New Jersey, to go back to Phila-
delphia and defeated in the House by only two
votes. The state of society may be imagined, when
he declared in his place that he had been threatened
with assassination if he did not abandon hie motion.
The investors in " real estate" did not fancy such
an end as the reward of their patience, their time
and energy being all expended in endeavouring to get
appropriations out of the Treasury to build up the
city. Early in its career it became a stronghold of
slavery, and but for the slaveholding influence the
project would have been carried of returning the
Government to Philadelphia. So strong was the
pro-slavery feeling that a prudent Abolitionist,
unless urged by necessity, gave Washington a wide
berth. This was the case up to the election of Lin-
coln, and during the civil war the principal inhabi-
tants were Southern in sentiment. They gloried
in Southern triumphs, and though many were large
owners of property in Washington, when the city
was threatened by the rebel armies, they favoured its
capture. The success of the South must have been
the annihilation of Washington ; the success of the
North makes it an important city; but the Southern
sympathizers could not see this. Within eight years
Washington has made a great stride, filling up gaps
intersecting the wide views of space. The magni-
tude of the Governmental machinery followiiig the
prodigious expediture during the war, and the cen-
tralization resulting from the defeat of the States
Rights question, have tended to add to the import-
ance of a town now losing the characteristic sneer-
ingly given to it by the Portuguese, of " the city of
magnificent distances." To-day its aspect differs
vastly from what Tom Moore so truly wrote of it
sixty-five years ago—
" The embryo capital whore Fancy sees
Squares in morasses, obelisks in trees."

Washington is destined to be a great city unless the
seat of Government be again removed, which he-
comes less and less probable with the increase of
population and the enormous disbursements in
manently establishing so vast a Government. It
contains somewhere about 65,000 inhabitants with
something under 15,000 in Georgetown, and, both
enjoy the peculiarity of alternating from the most
crowded to the moat empty of towns, now filled by
an excited throng from basement to garret, now
growing crops of grass in their deserted streets.