Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1858-1860, 1858-10-22
WASHINGTON.

w.
the home, during term-time, OF the President.
(also. the temporary residence Of FIVE hundred
and ten men who confidently expect to be
President and the seat of the United States
Gas Works, technically called COngress), is
situated in the District of Columbia, terri
tory covering horizontal surface of ten
miles square, and extending perpendicuiariy
all the way through. AS every place in the
city is from three-quarters OF a mile to mile
and three-auarters from everywhere else,
Washington is called, in Fourth of July ora
lions, and that style of literature generally,
"the city of magnificent distances" 1t de-
rives its name of Washington from cele-
brated continental officer who built fhc pine
huts and forged his way through a very hard
winter at Valley Forge, and made CORVALLIS
acknowledge the corn at York Town. The
principal public buildings OF the city are the
Patent Office, where the Yankees are granted
the exclusive right to manufacture and sell
india-rubber baby jumpers, double-geared rat
traps, Railways Ready Relief-wbch is war
ra1ted to relieve You Of your money, if moth
ing elsc--and other valuable inventions of
the age; the General Post Office, whore they
superntend the nIismanagemcnt of the vari-
Gus mail routes of the country; the National
Treasury an Institution of learning which
has graduated more men in the art Of swind-
ling the Government than any ten similar, or
dissimilar institutions in the world: and the
C. ty Jail, which is the only public building
in Washington which is really devoted to
honest purposes, and that is devoted to no
purposes at all. both the permanent and tenn
porary residents of the city being too deeply
engaged in their own rascalities TO think OF
plrshing other people for theirs.
There are two monuments in Washington
One of red granite. erected to the memory
of Mr. Smithson, at his own expense; and a
monument to the folly penuriOusness and in
gratitude OF the American people. The latter
is about sixty feet high, with upward GhOugh
hopeIess) expectations Of five or six handred
feet. 1t is commonly called the Washington
or National Monument. General Taylor
c,ught his death in 1850 at the laying of the
cornerstone of this structure. 1t is hardly
probable that any of his successors will perish
at the laying of the cap-stone. 1t is much
more probable that Presidents will be done
away with at least six weeks before that event
arrives.
The imports Of Washington consist princi-
pally of ofice-seekers and pickpockets, (both
of which are frequently combined in one),
and fast women, who Indirectly make half the
laws that are put through Congress. Its ex-
ports are disappointed politicians and whisky.
Tne latter is generally bottled, or rather I'M
bottled. in members of Congress for transpor-
tation.
Taking it altogether, Washington is an ex-
ceedingly hard place. The public men there
are all very honest and upright, however, that
is until they go home and turn against the
Administration, when, of course, they be-
come, like Stephen A. Douglas and John W.
Forney, the most consummate scoundrels IN
hung We have the authority of number
of Administration newspapers for saying so.
During the sitting of Congress though, in
Vulnerable murders and robberies are COM
mitted in the city; but as everybody there is
above suspicion, and wouldn't hurt a hair of
your head. nor take the smallest coin from
tie Treasury under the most favorable cir
cumstances, the perpetrators invariably escape
detection. Under these benign auspices, it is
no wonder that it cannot. or has not, been
said of Washington as was recently said of a
one-horse town in Kentucky, that if, at the
last day, Gabriel should happen to light there
first the resurrection would be Indefinitely
postponed, for some of the inhabitants
would SyUindIp him ont of his horn before he
could make single ID toot. y.