The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1905-05-04
Washington from the Heights.
By Mrs. Martha Lemon Schneider.


London is black, Paris yellow, New
York red; but Washington is charm.
ing combination of red, green and
white.
From the dome of the Capitol, OF
looking out of the windows at the tor
of the monument there is the tone oil
red from the stores and residences
the soft purplish-gray of the streets
and avenues, the silver flash from
the pools and fountains. the beauti.
full green from the innumerable parks
and trees, and the white of public
buildings and few of the hotels;
making the city beautiful in the
lowell valley between the green hills
of Maryland and Virginia.
From these heights one revels in
the beauty of the city, but as they
walk the streets they are charmed by
the picturesque appearance OF most
of its streets and avenues.
In no other city in the country will
one find the spirit of contrast so
pronounced in dwellings as in the
Capitol of the nation.
1t is possible for people in moderate
circumstances, like government
clerks, to live in neighborhood where
comfortable but old-fashioned houses
line the street, in the thickly settled
districts of the old part of the city,
but even here the contrasts to be found
in the houses are always surprise
to those from cities where row after
row of houses have been built all after
the same pattern. Washingtonians
have never taken to this method of
erecting homes.
People come here from all parts of
the United States and settle here, and
if they build or want to buy house,
they look for, or erect, one like those
that they have been accustomed to
seeing or occupying at home, so
Washington has always been cosmo-
politan in its architecture as we'll as
in everything else.
When a contractor builds row of
houses here, he varies them little
both externally and internally. One
house will be designed with bay
window running up three stories; the
next in the row will have the bay
window only up to the second story;
the next may be a three-storied bay,
but some difference will be made in
the shape of the bay or the arches OF
the windows or in some way will vary
from its neighbor
| These rows of houses are only 70
be found in the new parts of the CITY:
you seldom find them or more than
two houses alike in the old town.
In the West End one will find a
handsome residence equal in every
way to many of those in Fifth avenue,
and right next door to it a little
tumble-down dwelling hardly able to
stand alone, will be seen inhabited by
numberless representatives of the
cOlOred race.
There is no more beautiful street
than Sixteenth, which stretches in a
straight line from the White House
to Boundary Castle, the home of former
Senator and Mrs. Henderson. Stand.
ing at either end of this street the vista
is magnificent, especially so from
Meridian Hill upon which Boundary
Castle is located; but passing along
this thoroughfare one becomes
amazed at the strong contrasts in the
houses.
Poverty and wealth go side by side.
The modern homes of the wealthy,
the old novels of the destitute; man.
sions and tumbling-down, patched
and propped shanties nesting closely
to the palaces bristling with the skill
and taste of the trained architect.
You behold beautiful white marble
house with it's lace-draped windows,
and you see in imagination the
hostess and her daughters serving
afternoon tea, or hear the soft tones
of music of some coming-out party.
Prancing horses and magnificent
autos draw up before the door, and
you see world-renowned diplomats
and princes stop to pay their respects
but if you take side glance you see
leaning up against the side of the
house the remnants of fence, once a
shining white, but long since a
purplish hue of old wood, while back
of ii you find little old frame house
that fairly seems to totter as you look,
and leaning out the window or hang
ing on the gate little pick-a-ninnies
grin at the stylish callers of their next
door neighbors.
Sometimes in the evening the
wealthy and the poor have "party''
upon the same date, and the music
of the banjo and the glory OF the cake
walk drown the silver tones of the
orchestra screened behind graceful
palms in the mansion of the rich.
A quiet party at cards, in house
next to some colored folk, were sur