Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1853-12-17

is the due admxure Of loan and clay in the soil of great
portion Of the city that house may be built of brick
made OF the earth dug from the cellars hence II was not
unusual to see the remains Of brick kiln the new
lyerected dwelling house other edfce In short
when we consider not only these advantages but what
in national point Of view is Of superior the
location fine navgabe river accessible to the whols
maritime frontiers of the United States and yet easily rem
defensble against foreign invasion and that by the
facilities OF internal navigation and railways may
preached by the population Of the Western States and
indeed of the whole nation with less than
any other conceivable situation, we must acknowledge
that its selection by WASHINGTON the permanent Of
the Federal Government affords striking exhibition Of
the discernmen wisdom and forecast which characterized
that iustrious Under this impression whenever
during the six of my connection with Congress- the
question Of removing the Of to some other
place agated-and the proposition frequently
made-I stood almost alone Northern man in giving
my vote in the negative"
The following statistical tables, which, except the
last have been heretofore given in our paper, at
their respective dates will present condensed view
of the progress population in the city for the last
ffty-three years The first period includes the
members of the Government, clerks and others,
who here with the transfer of the seat of gov
eminent, as well as all the artisans and laborers
employed on the public buildings and grounds:
In 1900 .............3,2l0 In 1820.......13,474
In 1903 ..........4 ,332 In l83O...........18,S3l
In 1907 ..........5,652 In l84O...."..... 24,300
In 1910, .......S,208 In 1850. ....40,00l
In 1818...........1l 400 In 1868.
THE last is estimated amount probably consider
ably within the actual population.
BY these tables it will be seen that for the first
thirty years the increase of the population was only
1851, or a fraction more than $40 souls per an
mum. In the next ten years the rate Of increase
was fraction less than SGT per annuna. From
1910 to 1850 the increase, in round numbers was
Is, 800, or at the average rate of $50 per annu;
and in the last three years the increase has been
$4,000, or at the rate of 1888 and fraction per
annum. Taking the last thirteen years together,
the increase has been $780, or at the average rate
of 2,l92 and fraction. So that the increase of
the last thirteen years amounts to more than the
whole increase Of the first forty years.
These results are so different from any to be found
in the progressive growth of other cities that we
must naturally look to the operation of some extra
ordinary cause for their production, having no in
fuence on the natural increase of population in
other communities. This cause, we have no doubt,
has been the uncertainty long existing as to the
cty's being the permanent seat of government.
Having neither commerce nor manufactures to offer
as inducements to merf of capital to remove from
places of active business to city depending for its
prosperity upon the apparently unsettled will of a
majority in Congress, its population of course had
no aids to its natural rate of increase and this for
the first forty years trfe more than one and
half per cent. For the last eight or ten years all
uncertainty to the permanence of the seat of gov
eminent seems to have been dissipated. The libe-
ralty af Congress in the expenditure of money for
its improvement has given an impulse to the enter
prise of our moneyed citizens and streets that ten
years ago had scarcely houses enough upon them to
mark their locality now thicky -settled places
of business A new and tasteful style of
architecture has taken the place of the uncouth and
announcement models of earlier times. The number
of large and splendid buildings which have been
erected hotels refectories and private mansions,
within the last three or four years, has entirely
changed the face of the city, and given it an ap-
pearance more worthy of its name and more indica-
tive of future grandeur.
According to the old proverb, " Rome was not
built in day." At the end of the first half century
aJ u5e condita, the only public edice it contained
was rude fortress on the Palatine hill, and the
only private habitations were some miserable huts
filed with criminal fugtives from neighboring ma
tons and yet, before the lapse of many ages, she
became the mistress of the world in arts and arms.
ROME had none of the early difficulties to contend
against which have retarded the growth of WASH
INGToN. These difficulties being now removed from
her PATH we trust forever requires no seer opre
dict that before the close of another half century,
she will far surpass the Latin city in the palmiest
days of her renown.
Private letters dated Shanghai, 2lst September,
mention that the Russian Admiral PoUTIALINE had
arrived with his squadron before Nangasaky on the
22d August and was actively engaged with the
JononoSo authorities in nepntiaons which were not