The Red Cloud chief., 1881-04-14
mi PATENT OFFICE.

HA1ENI UlIlSLs
The business of the Department of
the Interior q carried on i'm an immense
cdiice that Il built round quadrangle,
and occupies two whole squares, half
way between the Capitol and the White
House. 1t is in the Doric style; aud al
though it is injured by the close prox-
unity Of the graceful Corinthian Post
Office, Just across the street, it is very
imposing, and is said 10 be absolutely
perfect in dimension and proportion.
The main portico of double rows OF col
umns is a copy of the ParthcDon at
Athens, although the Athenians would
never have set such a magnificent OBJ
ject on the side of the street.
Inside, ono meets stone stairways,
long corridors and groined and vaulted
ceilings upheld by mighty piers; but
one is not apt to lingcr in any of the
comfortable rooms where the clerks ex-
anime and and rescind patents,
but rather hurries to the grand museum.
which occupies the four huge halls OF
the second floor; encirciing the build
ing, and filed with great glass cases,
holding more than a hundred and fifty
thousand models. 81
These halls arc also superb rooms,
lofty, long and wide, some with paneicd
ceilings, and others with arches upheld
by massive pillars. the south hall being
the most attractive. finished in Pom
peiian colors, the columns, dressed in
very deep shades of blue. seeming to be
cut from blocks of lapis-lazuli, and sup
porting arches of black and dull red.
On eiiher side Of the hall stand cases
filled TO the top with models of many of
Our inventions since the great fire of
1856, which destroyed the earlier mod
els. and above there are galleries equal
ly full
The Pompeiian hall has something of
the air of a hall dressed tor legcrde-
main. and if you pause to think. you
will note q strange wizardry at work
there. You linger before a little print
impress, and as If magical clouds rose
and shut out the work-day world, the
skies of Greece are overhead, and the
Ancient searching for his lever, with
which to move the world, passes down
the ROOM, and fingers with you; for
surely he has found the lever, and sure
ly the world has been moved with it,
the boundaries of empires broken up,
kings discrowned, republics ruined.
Go farther: cas OF toys, harmless
tribes enough, arrests y~ou-cannOn a.
finger long, batteries the size OF q lady's
spool-stand, but the reduced Dodels of
death-dealing engines, whose power Of
wholesale slaughter may one day revo-
~lutionize the codes of Nations, and
abolish warfare. = In another case you
observe only a lump of coal, a vial of
pitch, a flask of oil; and the necroman-
Ger of the place has dipped his rod
down into the central darkness of the
earth and drawn uplight like the days.
Yet beyond; an iron stirrup and a
slender spur, and the sewing girl has
but TO set her foot there, and escape the
shapes that dog her. Not far away,
again, We remember the oriental magi-
clan, who as often rs the King cut off
his head, grew another in its place, as
we see the machinery for a feat almost
rs wonderful in the exact anatomy of
steel springs and leather ligaments
made to fit upon the very eryes of vo-
lition themselves, till the halt walk, and
the manned are made whole. In this
spot is the jar into which the fisherman
shut the afrite; in that are the great
genii who gather in n harvest; and in
still another there lies q tiny thing an
swering your touch with no louder
noise than a buzz and q click, but its
whisper can be heard from end to end
of the land, and it runs beneath the
roar OF ocean TO carry the voice of n
world to another.
But other things than those of this
sort of enchantment are to be found in
this hall. There are a number of his
torical relics of value. There are some
articles belonging to Lafayette,
clothesNebrn by General Jackson, the
gloves of President Lincoln, the saddle
of Baron de kalb, and other saddles
with housings. embroidered with jew
els, the gift of the lmaum of Muscat.
Sabers, fine as the blade of Saladin,
given by Ali Pacha 20 some of Our
officers; n gun sent to Jefferson by the
Emperor of Morocco; carpets of extra
ordinary thickness and beauty, also
presented to members of our Govern
ment by other Eastern potentates, who
have seemed to vie with each other in
offering the kindness of the Orient to
Nv SSSlAOilts OHk WufCu, Will OtucE
articles-as officials in the National
employ are not allowed to receive gifts
from foreign princes have been depos-
tied here. Here. too, in another case,
is the original copy of the Declaration
of Independence, very much faded,
though, by long exposure to the light,
and with the sacred autographs upon
it. with all they tell of the writer's, and
of their intrepidity in taking their lives
IN their hands as they took up the
pen. 1t is so fast disappearing that
II wonders it should not be preserved
in the darkest archives of the State
Department. In the same case, and in
a neighboring one, are numberless rel
les OF George and Martha Wash
ington. There are his commission
OF Commander-in- Chief, his sword,
his cane, and more than one
suit OF his clothes, which you wonder
how he ever got into. There are odd
pieces OF furniture used by the General
in the course of his life; q secretary. A
small mirror, tea board, tables. chairs.
andlrons. bed curtains worked in tam
bour by his wife. some candelabra, the
remainder OF a set of china presented
him by the Society of the Cincinnati.
There is his coat-of-arms with biazons
and guarterings thai tell OF the Wash
ington connection with such lives as
those of Malcolm, King of. the Scots, the
Duke of Clarence. and the Earls of
Huntingdon, March, Monmouth and
Salisbury. There, too, is his camp
eguipage, his sleeping tent, and anoth-
er tent and tent poles, under which he
has lain on what nights of storm and
trouble! There are his compass and
little treasure chest and his camp chest
very different from the camp chest of
any modern general-with its half
dozen pewter plates and platters, its
rude gridiron and salt and pepper
boxes. its primitive knives and two
pronged forks, that, as some one has
said, may more than once have wound
ed the august tongue and lips when
used at some hasty meal under forest
bOughs, while the stars retreated before
the blaze of the camp fire. Among all
these interesting and wonderful, and
often almost holy things, the young