Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1874-02-12
down and built the city in the muddy,
low marsh behind the temple of liberty,
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low marsh 0ehand the temple OF liberty,
so now the front of the building, with
its imposing colonnades, its project
ing, graceful wings, its picturesque
groups Of statuary, and its long ter
raced ranges of steps, flowing down
in white, marble waves to the ground,
merely looks out upon a sowowful lit
tie desert Of cheap boal ding-houses
So you observe that you take your
view from the back of the Capitol.
And yet not from the airy outlooks Of
the dome, by the way, because to get
there you must pass through the
great rotunda: and to do that, you
would have to see the marvellous his
torical paintings that hang there, and
the bas-reliefs aud what have you
done that you should suffer thus?
And besides, you might have to pass
through the old part of the building,
and you could not help seeing Mr..
Lincoln, as petrifed by young artist
for s1O,OO0-and you might take his
marble emancipation proclamation,
which he holds out in his hand and
contemplates, for a folded napkin ;
and you nigh conceive from his ex-
preston and his attitude, that he is
finding fault with the washing. Which
is not the case. Nobody knows what
is the matter with him; but every
body feels for him. Well, you ought
not to 60 into the dome any how, be-
cause it would be utterly impossible
to 60 there without seeing the fres.
Goes in it-and why should you be
interested in the delirium tremens OF
art?
The Capitol is a very noble and
very beautiful building, both within
and without, but you need not ex-
anime it now. Still, if you greatly
prefer going into the dome, go. Now
your general glance gives you pictur-
esque stretches of cleaning water on
your left, with here and there a sail
and lunatic asylum on shore; over
beyond the water on distant eleva
ton, you see a squat yellow temple,
which your eye dwells upon lovingly
thro' blur of unmanly moisture, for
it recalls your lost boyhood and the
Parthenons done in molasses candy
which made it blest and beautiful.
Still in the distance, but on this side
of the water and close to its edge, the
monument of the Father of his Coun-
try, towers out of the mud-sacred
soil is the customary term. 1t has
the aspect of a factory chimney with
the top broken off. The skeleton of
a decaying scaffolding fingers about
its summit, and tradition says that the
spirit of Washington often comes
down and sits on those rafters to en-
joy this tribute of respect which the
nation has reared as the symbol Of its
unappeasable gratitude. The monu-
ment is to be finished, some day, and
at that time our Washington will have
risen still higher in the nations ven
Grafton, and will be known as the
Great Great Grandfather of his Coun-
try. The memorial Chimney stands
in quiet pastoral locality that is full
ofreposeful expression. With a glass
you can see the cow-sheds at its base,
and the contented sheep nibbling peb-
bles in the desert solitudes that sur
round it, and the tired pigs doing in
the holy claim of its protecting shad.
ow.
Now you wrench your gaze loose,
and you look down in front of you
and see the broad Pennsylvania
Avenue stretching straight ahead for
mile or more till it brings up againts
the iron fence in front of pillared
granite pile, the Treasury building
an edlfice that would command re-
spcct in any capital. The stores and
hotels that wall in this avenue are
mean and cheap and dingy, and are
better left without comment. Beyond
the Treasury is fine, large white
barn, with wide, unhandsome grounds
about it. The President lives there.
1t is ugly enough outside, but that is
nothing to what it is inside. Dreari.
ness, fimsiness, bad taste reduced to
mathematical completeness is what
the inside offers to the eye if it re-
mains yet what it always has been.
The front and right hand views
give you the city at large. 1t is
wide stretch of cheap little brick
houses, with here and there a noble
architectural pile lifting itself out of
the m;dst-Government buildings