Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1892-05-06
OUR NATIONAL CAPITAL.
Points and Features of Interest


Among the dreams of my early life in
quiet Williamsville, was the hope that
should some day visit our national capital,
and being here, it occurred to me that
some of my Vermont friends not similarly
favored might wish to learn some of my
impressions through our "mutual friend, -
The Phoenix.
| think this the most beautiful city
ever saw, repete as it also is with historic
memories of the greatest and best Ameri-
cans, many of whom, from Washington to
Lincoln, were important factors in our ma
tional life, and | made a pilgrimage to the
old building, once Ford's theatre, where
the latter was so basely assassinated and
sorrowfully entered the room across the
street where he breathed his last.
The city was laid out under the immedi-
ate supervision of Washington, with the
capitol as a centre and streets at right an
giles with the four cardinal points of the
compass, but unlike any other city that |
ever heard of, it has other streets called
avenues crossing the right-angled streets in
almost every direction. Thus the capitol
may be likened to the hub of a great wheel
with these avenues forming eight spokes, so
if in any part of the city you only have to
go to one of these avenues and can then 90
straight to the hub. PENNSYLVANIA avenue
seems to be the most important, passing as
it does the capitol, treasury, war and navy
departments, and White House, to say
nothing of minor objects of interest, in its
long course. Its 100 feet width of asphalt
tum pavement almost as smooth as a floor
help, with others similarly paved, to make
this a very paradise of bicycle riders. and
you see them gliding along on every hand,
outstripping the horses as they go.
The first Sunday after our arrival we
saw President Harrison and some of the
ladies of his family at the church of the
Covenant, where they attend. The follow
ing Sunday we went to Alexandria, some
eight miles away, and going to Christ
church where Washington used to attend
We're fortunately ushered into the VERT
able double pew where the Father of
his country sat SO often, and saw right
across the aisle No. 10, which was
long occupied by Gen. r. +. Lee, who
used to drive over from Arlington. On
one side of the old-fashioned little pulpit
with its quaint sounding board is a marble
tablet inscribed to the memory of George
Washington, and on the other side one eX-
actly like it to the memory of Robert Ed
ward Lee After services were over we
wandered a few minutes in the thinly-peo-
pied churchyard and then took our way to
the Braddock House, large hotel which
contains, it is said, the original rooms once
occupied by Gen. Braddock before his i'll
fated Western expedition which cost him
his life. In the parlor adjoining his sleep
ing room it is said that Braddock first met
the youthful Washington, and we were
told that the beautiful Mrs. Gusts first
met her future husband in that same room.
We had previously visited Mount Yer
non, delightful ride down the broad and
beautiful Potomac of an hour and half
After landing we came to the brick vault
where the illustrious dead reposes in a cof-
tin-shaped marble sarcophagus with feet
towards the grated door. A few feet away
lie the ashes of Martha, his wife, and in
the closed vault at the back are said to lie
about 80 of the Washington and Gusts rel
atives. Next we stroled up the hill to the
mansion, wooden two-storied building
with finished attic, in one of which attic
rooms exactly over the one where her hus-
band died about two years before, Mar
tina Washington departed. The principal
rooms below can be entered, but Others are
closed by implanted wicket doors about
four feet high, while upstairs most of the
rooms are so guarded, but a good view of
many articles in these rooms we had, and
in Washington's bedroom we were shown
the bed which he last occupied. La Fay
cites room is shown, and one other is des-
ignated as that of Miss Nellie Gusts. The
old colonial porch all along the east side
shelters both stories and is paved with
worn and curiously splintered sandstone
in pieces about a foot square. The old
kitchen still remains with its enormous
fireplace.
Washington used to be called a city of
magnificent distances, which still holds
true in a great degree, and we found it
convenient to take a cab to the Washing
ton monument where we took our places
in the rear of the line that was waiting adj
mission to the elevator when it should come
down. 1t takes nine minutes to ascend
the 500 feet and eight to come down. On
the way up l saw the sculptured block of
marble bearing Vermont's coat of arms,
over $50 feet from the ground, as well as
tablets from other states and some foreign
nations.
The national museum is tiresomely in
teresting place, but contains much that can
be seen nowhere else. Here is shown the
tree that was shot down with musket balls
at AppOmattoX-an oak fully Is inches
across. | mean, of course, a section of
the tree forming the bulet-shivered stump.
Here we see the shotgun that killed Els
worth and the musket that closed the ca
reer of his murderer Jackson. | was
shocked as my attention was called to a
couple of human heads not larger than
good sized apple, with abundant straight
black hair and well defined features, the
broad mouths closed by sewing the pro-
truding lips with coarse, dangling Irvine.
l learned that these CHASTITY relics are made
by Indians in the valley of the Amazon,
who cut off the heads of their enemies and
by skillfully taking the bones out through
the neck and filling their place repeatedly
with hot sand, so shrink the remaining
sack composed of face and scalp that it re-
tans it shape while several times reduced
in size. / cannot speak of the thousands
of other curiosities there displayed and can
only allude to the Smithsonian institution,
devoted to scientific research, the army
medical museum the fish commission and
other places of interest.
The COrcOran art gallery, bequest to
the city by the eminent Irish banker, has
among the statuary the original statue of
the Greek slave by Powers, and many
costly and historic paintings adOrn the
walls. The cane used by Napoleon at
St. Helena with piece of the willow that
grew at his grave is there, and not far away
the writing desk of Alexander Hamilton.
BY the way l wish all who read this could
see one piece of sculpture, "The Yelled
Nun," so eXquisitey done that the features
are visible beneath the flmy veil which
covers the face, though better and full
length representation of the same subipct