Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1896-08-01

the neighborhood that the people had to
s.eep under reed bird nets. if they didn't
have screens to the windows and door; to
keep them out. and Captain Baghy. a truth
full man, said with a sigh that he feared
the club fishing was failing.as the last lime
he was out he had only caught 100 pounds
OF fish. When 1t Is remembered that the
club of the Rappahannock is the active
and energetic bass of other streams. Cap
tain Bagby's grief will be better understood.
If the President hasn't tried Tappahannock
my advice to him would be to take Joe Mil
Ter and scow to bring home his game and
fish In, and go down that way on his next
trip.
Tappahannock is the county seat of Essex
county, and in October 1t has a grand fair
and horse race that would be well worth
making the trip from Washington to see.
Near the town. along the river bank. is an
cid Indian graveyard. and those persons
desiring pleasing and pretty souvenirs of
Iappahannock can carry away a skull or
thigh bone or some-whatever they happen
10 come across sticking out of the sand.
Back of Layton'S in the country is the
place formerly owned by that famous Nir-
ginian. r. NJ. T. Hunter and now occupied
by some of his children.
In this neighborhcod is the finest home
place on the river, the residence and farm
OF the widow of w. F. Pratt The
house Is not colonial, but it is of ante-bel-
lum times. and with its beautiful lawn. its
wide porches. Its broad bay windows. its
cool gray walls. its string of red steps
Ii aiding down the grassy terrace to the lit
tie dock. with it's pretty sailboat bobbng
on the water. 1t constitutes a picture so
sweet and restful that the steamboat in
voluntarily runs slower in passing 1t.
Port Royal.
At Pot Royal we are treated to the sec
ond largest collection of houses on the
river and Port Royal lives now on the
glory of the tradition that when the
ticn's fathers were deciding where to locate
the capital of the new republic Port Royal
missed it by only one vote. 1 am going to
look up who cast that vote and send his
name down to Port Royal, and II those peo-
pie don't make it unpleasant for his mem
Dry. then I'm not judge of temper. l
want to say for Port Royal however. that
next after Sharp's wharf. there are no pref
tier girls on the river than the lasses Of
Port Royal.
Salt water stops at Tappahannock. and
whereas the river IS clear and green from
that point down. from that point Up It is
pure yellow golden. and is that way al
ways from which it may be inferred that
salt in water has tendency to drive the
mud out Of IT or to the bottom. BY the
way. Tappahannock and Crbanna, further
down the river, and just a bit back in the
country, are of the same age as Philadel-
phia. which according to the books was
laid out by old Billy Penn in 1852. Phila-
delphia has distanced both these towns.
however. in everything except that heauti-
L
long been feature of the city of brotEery
love.
A Winding Stream.
Leaving Port Royal, which we did about
o'clock In the evening. we found the
river not any longer the river of the
lowlands, but stream winding In and out
among the hills and making such sharp
angles that at times we felt that the
steamer would run her nose into the bank
and stop there, but at the turn the strea m
opened away to right or left and we went
on and on and upward into the heart of
the land. AS night settled down upon the
river and the moon came out in the full
ness of her golden glory, and spread her
mystic witchery over the world, it was as
If we were sailing upon some fairy sea
whose shores fringed in the shadows gave
back no sound and whose waves bore us
resistlessly onward into the realms of ST.
lence, into the harbor of peace.
In the meantime the doctor was paving
the floor because there was no soft-voiced
maiden to talk to, and Capt Burroughs,
nerve to keep the boat from going aground
and not getting to Fredericksburg before
breakfast.
1t was $50 o'clock when we reached the
end of the journey by water and the last
twenty-five miles Of that river is memory
of tortuous loneliness and twisted charms
bathed in moonshine and framed in by per-
fumed hedges that will remain with the
At Fredericksburg the river Is eighty
yards wide, at its mouth, 40 miles away, it
is seven or eight miles wide, and one can
imagine how it feels to go all day, narrow
ing narrowing, narrowing, until at the end
the boat has to climb the bank to turn
around. I mention this going ashore of the
boat advisedly, because just across the
river where the boat stops Is the Washing
ton farm whsre our George in his youth
chopped down the cherry tree and couldn't
tell a lie. Strange as 1t may seem, no one
who has owned that farm since has been
able to raise any cherries on 1t. That's
me in perfect confidence.
Fredericksburg.
Fredericksburg, which is at the Falls Of
the Rappahannock. and the head Of navi-
cation and tide water. is a town Of fifty
FIVE hundred people and one OF the most
interesting towns in the United States. It
il sixty miles from Washington, the same
distance from Richmond. and a. it o.
cupied the same position during the war,
1t IL not hard guessing to say what kind
Of q time 1t had between 1881 and 1865.
AZ q matter OF fact, more battles have
been fought within ten miles Of Fredericks.
burg than In the Same extent OF country
anywhere else on the GLOBE ana more men
were killed In those fights than have bean
killed in all the wars Of England during
war record. Now what the government
should do would be to establish the Fred
ericksbur1 National Park and preserve
those battiehelds whore 80 much Of the
nations blood was shed,
Fredericksburg 10 Q polSy old town. that's