The age-herald., 1902-02-16

making Washington the wonder and the admiration of the world. The scheme provides for parks, shaded roads, foun- tains, magnificent bridges spanning the Potomac noble colonnade as a memo rial to Lincoln, statues of the nations heroes. pools for water sports. river l driveways, shaded avenues and an elab- crate system of public buildings in gleam- ing white marble A generation will not be too long for the execution of these | wondrous works but its beauties will be unfolded from year to year.
 | Washington's system of diagonal ave- | nues and circles Is a striking feature. It is credited to Maj. Peter Charles L' En- fant, a young French engineer, who had been commended to General Washington | during the revolution by Count DEs- taing l. Enfant settled in New York af- ter the war, and was called to the work by President Washington after Maj. An drew Ellicott had marked the bounda- ries of the new District of Columbia. The President and the Frenchman tramped over the hills and crept through the forests to study the lay of the land and select desirable sites for the capitol and the executive mansion. L'Enfant then took up the work of drawing the plans for the city, reporting to Jefferson. then Secretary of State, twice a week by mail. Jefferson also furnished maps of a number of European cities, with notes he had made on the margins during his foreign sojourn.
 That Washington and Jefferson played an important part in the blaming of the nations capital is indicated by the fact | that they rejected the first two plans sub | mitted by l. Enfant. It is a fair presump- l ton that they made suggestions that | were embodied in the third and final plan. The commissioners of the federal
 district decreed a system of streets run ming north and south. crossed by others running east and west. To the French
 engineer is probably due the credit for the diagonal streets which add so much character to Washington. With the cir cles at the intersections they make the map of the city look like a series of hubs, with lines radiating in all directions. The axial system is supposed to have ben borrowed from Lenotre, the great French landscape artist.
 LEnfant planned the city as a work | of art in which the chief features should l have relation to each other. Thus the 1 Congress house and the Presidents man sion were connected by that broad stretch of Pennsylvania avenue. He laid out another magnificent link between 1 those two buildings in the form of a park running westward from the capitol to the site of the Washington monument, and thence north to the White House lot. This was to have an avenue 400 feet wide, 1 bordered by beautiful gardens which in turn were to be fanked with the public buildings. Where the axis of the White House and that of the capitol met was to be placed the equestrian statue of Wash | fngton voted by Congress in 1793, but the monument was placed near that point. 1 There were twenty-five springs within | the city limits, which were to furnish the | capital with numerous fountains and cas- cades, and Fiber Creek was to be trans formed into a canal.
 The Burnham commission has decided the L'Enfant plans are so admirable that they should be carried out and that other beauties hould be added in unison with his general scheme. The commission has pre- pared a large number of sketches and drawings to show the improvements it proposes, and they clearly indicate what a paragon of municipal beauty the Amer ican capital may become.
 Perhaps the most important feature Is the treatment of the Mall. the neglected ! rark extending for a mile and a half l from the capitol to the monument and 1 there joining the White House grounds. l By a simple device of planting the com | mission proposes to bring the monument l into the capitol vista, so that an ob- server standing on the western terrace | of the capitol shall look over a green carpet bordered on each side by four rows of elms to the monolith rising from plain. The great needle is to be adorned by a splendid terrace at it's base to heighten its majestic effect.
 The commission proposes to extend the Mall mile beyond the monument to ! the Potomac River by using the reclaimed | marshes. This will add greatly to the park and afford a fine site for a new 1 and grand national memorial. Abraham Lincoln has no adequate monument in 1 Washington. and the commission has suggested an imposing memorial for the martyr President to stand on the bank | of the river. The type is great portico of Doric columns rising from an unbrok- | en platform.
 The plans contemplate columns 40 feet | in height on base POO feet long by 50 feet in width. The columns are to sup port a panel bearing an inscription worthy of Lincoln. The portico is to be embellished by groups of sculpture. to be | surmounted by a central. crowning group of statuary and to be approached from the east and west by flights of stairs
 From the portico one vii be able to look
 westward acros the proposed memorial bridge to sacred Arlington or eastward to the capitol. From 1t will radiate the
 new driveway. which is to wind up the valley to Rock Creek to the National Zoo and it's park. Another road will run
 down the Potomac, whose miasmatic
 swamps are to be drained and trans
 formed into a river front park.
 Between the monument and the portico
 is to be garden rIvaling the finest found
 in Europe. It is to be surrounded by ter
 races carrying groves of elms, and the
 commission thinks 1t may become the
 gem of the whole park system. South
 of the monument. between the garden
 and the river, are to be basins for swim
 ming and skating, a stadium for games
 and an esplanade for fireworks and for
 field sports. On the river bank or in the river, facing the White House, may be
 placed a colosal figure emblematic of the