E-text prepared by Donald Lainson and revised by Joseph E. Loewenstein,
M.D.
Editorial note:
Anthony Trollope travelled through the United States from
August, 1861, to May, 1862. He visited all the states that
did not secede except California. This book is partly a
journal of his travels and partly his description of American
customs and culture including industry, education, government,
military affairs, religion, transportation, and even
hotels. To an American of today it provides a revealing and
fascinating picture of life at the time.
The book was first published in two volumes by Chapman & Hall
in 1862.
Project Gutenberg has the other volume of this work.
Volume I: see https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1865
NORTH AMERICA
by
ANTHONY TROLLOPE
In Two Volumes
VOL. II
CONTENTS
I. WASHINGTON.
II. CONGRESS.
III. THE CAUSES OF THE WAR.
IV. WASHINGTON TO ST. LOUIS.
V. MISSOURI.
VI. CAIRO AND CAMP WOOD.
VII. THE ARMY OF THE NORTH.
VIII. BACK TO BOSTON.
IX. THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.
X. THE GOVERNMENT.
XI. THE LAW COURTS AND LAWYERS OF THE UNITED STATES.
XII. THE FINANCIAL POSITION.
XIII. THE POST-OFFICE.
XIV. AMERICAN HOTELS.
XV. LITERATURE.
XVI. CONCLUSION.
APPENDIX A. DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.
APPENDIX B. ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION, ETC.
APPENDIX C. CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES.
CHAPTER I.
WASHINGTON.
The site of the present city of Washington was chosen with three
special views; firstly, that being on the Potomac it might have the
full advantage of water-carriage and a sea-port; secondly, that
it might be so far removed from the seaboard as to be safe from
invasion; and, thirdly, that it might be central alike to all the
States. It was presumed when Washington was founded that these three
advantages would be secured by the selected position. As regards the
first, the Potomac affords to the city but few of the advantages
of a sea-port. Ships can come up, but not ships of large burthen.
The river seems to have dwindled since the site was chosen; and at
present it is, I think, evident that Washington can never be great in
its shipping. _Statio benefida carinis_ can never be its motto. As
regards the second point, singularly enough Washington is the only
city of the Union that has been in an enemy's possession since the
United States became a nation. In the war of 1812 it fell into our
hands, and we burnt it. As regards the third point, Washington, from
the lie of the land, can hardly have been said to be centrical at
any time. Owing to the irregularities of the coast it is not easy of
access by railways from different sides. Baltimore would have been
far better. But as far as we can now see, and as well as we can now
judge, Washington will soon be on the borders of the nation to which
it belongs, instead of at its centre. I fear, therefore, that we must
acknowledge that the site chosen for his country's capital by George
Washington has not been fortunate.
I have a strong idea, which I expressed before in speaking of the
capital of the Canadas, that no man can ordain that on such a spot
shall be built a great and thriving city. No man can so ordain even
though he leave behind him, as was the case with Washington, a
prestige sufficient to bind his successors to his wishes. The
political leaders of the country have done what they could for
Washington. The pride of the nation has endeavoured to sustain
the character of its chosen metropolis. There has been no rival,
soliciting favour on the strength of other charms. The country has
all been agreed on the point since the father of the country first
commenced the work. Florence and Rome in Italy have each their
pretensions; but in the States no other city has put itself forward
for the honour of entertaining Congress. And yet Washington has been
a failure. It is commerce that makes great cities, and commerce has
refused to back the General's choice. New York and Philadelphia,
without any political power, have become great among the cities of
the earth. They are beaten by none except by London and Paris. But
Washington is but a ragged, unfinished collection of unbuilt broad
streets, as to the completion of which there can now, I imagine, be
but little hope.
Of all places that I know it is the most ungainly and most
unsatisfactory;--I fear I must also say the most presumptuous in its
pretensions. There is a map of Washington accurately laid down; and
taking that map with him in his journeyings a man may lose himself in
the streets, not as one loses oneself in London between Shoreditch
and Russell Square, but as one does so in the deserts of the Holy
Land, between Emmaus and Arimathea. In the first place no one knows
where the places are, or is sure of their existence, and then between
their presumed localities the country is wild, trackless, unbridged,
uninhabited, and desolate. Massachusetts Avenue runs the whole length
of the city, and is inserted on the maps as a full-blown street,
about four miles in length. Go there, and you will find yourself not
only out of town, away among the fields, but you will find yourself
beyond the fields, in an uncultivated, undrained wilderness. Tucking
your trousers up to your knees you will wade through the bogs, you
will lose yourself among rude hillocks, you will be out of the reach
of humanity. The unfinished dome of the Capitol will loom before you
in the distance, and you will think that you approach the ruins of
some western Palmyra. If you are a sportsman, you will desire to
shoot snipe within sight of the President's house. There is much
unsettled land within the States of America, but I think none so
desolate in its state of nature as three-fourths of the ground on
which is supposed to stand the city of Washington.
The city of Washington is something more than four miles long, and
is something more than two miles broad. The land apportioned to it
is nearly as compact as may be, and it exceeds in area the size
of a parallelogram four miles long by two broad. These dimensions
are adequate for a noble city, for a city to contain a million of
inhabitants. It is impossible to state with accuracy the actual
population of Washington, for it fluctuates exceedingly. The place
is very full during Congress, and very empty during the recess.
By which I mean it to be understood that those streets, which
are blessed with houses, are full when Congress meets. I do not
think that Congress makes much difference to Massachusetts Avenue.
I believe that the city never contains as many as eighty thousand,
and that its permanent residents are less than sixty thousand.
But, it will be said,--was it not well to prepare for a growing city?
Is it not true that London is choked by its own fatness, not having
been endowed at its birth or during its growth, with proper means for
accommodating its own increasing proportions? Was it not well to lay
down fine avenues and broad streets, so that future citizens might
find a city well prepared to their hand?
There is no doubt much in such an argument, but its correctness must
be tested by its success. When a man marries it is well that he
should make provision for a coming family. But a Benedict, who early
in his career shall have carried his friends with considerable
self-applause through half-a-dozen nurseries and at the end of twelve
years shall still be the father of one ricketty baby, will incur a
certain amount of ridicule. It is very well to be prepared for good
fortune, but one should limit one's preparation within a reasonable
scope. Two miles by one might perhaps have done for the skeleton
sketch of a new city. Less than half that would contain much more
than the present population of Washington; and there are, I fear, few
towns in the Union so little likely to enjoy any speedy increase.
Three avenues sweep the whole length of Washington;--Virginia Avenue,
Pennsylvania Avenue, and Massachusetts Avenue. But Pennsylvania
Avenue is the only one known to ordinary men, and the half of that
only is so known. This avenue is the backbone of the city, and those
streets which are really inhabited cluster round that half of it
which runs westward from the Capitol. The eastern end, running from
the front of the Capitol, is again a desert. The plan of the city is
somewhat complicated. It may truly be called "a mighty maze, but not
without a plan." The Capitol was intended to be the centre of the
city. It faces eastward, away from the Potomac,--or rather from the
main branch of the Potomac, and also unfortunately from the main body
of the town. It turns its back upon the chief thoroughfare, upon the
Treasury buildings, and upon the President's house; and indeed upon
the whole place. It was, I suppose, intended that the streets to the
eastward should be noble and populous, but hitherto they have come
to nothing. The building therefore is wrong side foremost, and all
mankind who enter it, senators, representatives, and judges included,
go in at the back-door. Of course it is generally known that in
the Capitol is the Chamber of the Senate, that of the House of
Representatives, and the Supreme Judicial Court of the Union. It may
be said that there are two centres in Washington, this being one and
the President's house the other. At these centres the main avenues
are supposed to cross each other, which avenues are called by the
names of the respective States. At the Capitol, Pennsylvania Avenue,
New Jersey Avenue, Delaware Avenue, and Maryland Avenue converge.
They come from one extremity of the city to the square of the Capitol
on one side, and run out from the other side of it to the other
extremity of the city. Pennsylvania Avenue, New York Avenue, Vermont
Avenue, and Connecticut Avenue do the same at what is generally
called President's Square. In theory, or on paper, this seems to be a
clear and intelligible arrangement; but it does not work well. These
centre depots are large spaces, and consequently one portion of a
street is removed a considerable distance from the other. It is as
though the same name should be given to two streets, one of which
entered St. James's Park at Buckingham Gate, while the other started
from the Park at Marlborough House. To inhabitants the matter
probably is not of much moment, as it is well known that this portion
of such an avenue and that portion of such another avenue are merely
myths,--unknown lands away in the wilds. But a stranger finds himself
in the position of being sent across the country knee-deep into the
mud, wading through snipe grounds, looking for civilization where
none exists.
All these avenues have a slanting direction. They are so arranged
that none of them run north and south or east and west; but the
streets, so called, all run in accordance with the points of the
compass. Those from east to west are A Street, B Street, C Street,
and so on,--counting them away from the Capitol on each side, so that
there are two A streets and two B streets. On the map these streets
run up to V Street, both right and left,--V Street North and V Street
South. Those really known to mankind are E, F, G, H, I, and K Streets
North. Then those streets which run from north to south are numbered
First Street, Second Street, Third Street, and so on, on each front
of the Capitol, running to Twenty-fourth or Twenty-fifth Street on
each side. Not very many of these have any existence, or I might
perhaps more properly say, any vitality in their existence.
Such is the plan of the city, that being the arrangement and those
the dimensions intended by the original architects and founders of
Washington; but the inhabitants have hitherto confined themselves to
Pennsylvania Avenue West, and to the streets abutting from it or near
to it. Whatever address a stranger may receive, however perplexing
it may seem to him, he may be sure that the house indicated is near
Pennsylvania Avenue. If it be not, I should recommend him to pay no
attention to the summons. Even in those streets with which he will
become best acquainted, the houses are not continuous. There will be
a house, and then a blank; then two houses, and then a double blank.
After that a hut or two, and then probably an excellent, roomy,
handsome family mansion. Taken altogether, Washington as a city is
most unsatisfactory, and falls more grievously short of the thing
attempted than any other of the great undertakings of which I have
seen anything in the States. San Jose, the capital of the republic of
Costa Rica, in Central America, has been prepared and arranged as a
new city in the same way. But even San Jose comes nearer to what was
intended than does Washington.
For myself, I do not believe in cities made after this fashion.
Commerce, I think, must select the site of all large congregations of
mankind. In some mysterious way she ascertains what she wants, and
having acquired that, draws men in thousands round her properties.
Liverpool, New York, Lyons, Glasgow, Venice, Marseilles, Hamburg,
Calcutta, Chicago, and Leghorn, have all become populous, and are or
have been great, because trade found them to be convenient for its
purposes. Trade seems to have ignored Washington altogether. Such
being the case, the Legislature and the Executive of the country
together have been unable to make of Washington anything better than
a straggling congregation of buildings in a wilderness. We are now
trying the same experiment at Ottawa, in Canada, having turned our
back upon Montreal in dudgeon. The site of Ottawa is more interesting
than that of Washington, but I doubt whether the experiment will be
more successful. A new town for art, fashion, and politics has been
built at Munich, and there it seems to answer the expectation of the
builders; but at Munich there is an old city as well, and commerce
had already got some considerable hold on the spot before the new
town was added to it.
The streets of Washington, such as exist, are all broad. Throughout
the town there are open spaces,--spaces, I mean, intended to be open
by the plan laid down for the city. At the present moment it is
almost all open space. There is also a certain nobility about the
proposed dimensions of the avenues and squares. Desirous of praising
it in some degree, I can say that the design is grand. The thing
done, however, falls so infinitely short of that design, that nothing
but disappointment is felt. And I fear that there is no look-out
into the future which can justify a hope that the design will be
fulfilled. It is therefore a melancholy place. The society into which
one falls there consists mostly of persons who are not permanently
resident in the capital; but of those who were permanent residents I
found none who spoke of their city with affection. The men and women
of Boston think that the sun shines nowhere else;--and Boston Common
is very pleasant. The New Yorkers believe in Fifth Avenue with an
unswerving faith; and Fifth Avenue is calculated to inspire a faith.
Philadelphia to a Philadelphian is the centre of the universe, and
the progress of Philadelphia, perhaps, justifies the partiality. The
same thing may be said of Chicago, of Buffalo, and of Baltimore. But
the same thing cannot be said in any degree of Washington. They who
belong to it turn up their noses at it. They feel that they live
surrounded by a failure. Its grand names are as yet false, and none
of the efforts made have hitherto been successful. Even in winter,
when Congress is sitting, Washington is melancholy;--but Washington
in summer must surely be the saddest spot on earth.
There are six principal public buildings in Washington, as to which
no expense seems to have been spared, and in the construction of
which a certain amount of success has been obtained. In most of these
this success has been more or less marred by an independent deviation
from recognized rules of architectural taste. These are the Capitol,
the Post-office, the Patent-office, the Treasury, the President's
house, and the Smithsonian Institute. The five first are Grecian,
and the last in Washington is called--Romanesque. Had I been left to
classify it by my own unaided lights, I should have called it bastard
Gothic.
The Capitol is by far the most imposing; and though there is much
about it with which I cannot but find fault, it certainly is
imposing. The present building was, I think, commenced in 1815, the
former Capitol having been destroyed by the English in the war of
1812-13. It was then finished according to the original plan, with a
fine portico and well-proportioned pediment above it,--looking to the
east. The outer flight of steps, leading up to this from the eastern
approach, is good and in excellent taste. The expanse of the building
to the right and left, as then arranged, was well proportioned,
and, as far as we can now judge, the then existing dome was well
proportioned also. As seen from the east the original building
must have been in itself very fine. The stone is beautiful, being
bright almost as marble, and I do not know that there was any great
architectural defect to offend the eye. The figures in the pediment
are mean. There is now in the Capitol a group apparently prepared for
a pediment, which is by no means mean. I was informed that they were
intended for this position; but they, on the other hand, are too good
for such a place, and are also too numerous. This set of statues
is by Crawford. Most of them are well known, and they are very
fine. They now stand within the old chamber of the Representative
House, and the pity is, that if elevated to such a position as that
indicated, they can never be really seen. There are models of them
all at West Point, and some of them I have seen at other places in
marble. The Historical Society at New York has one or two of them.
In and about the front of the Capitol there are other efforts of
sculpture,--imposing in their size, and assuming, if not affecting,
much in the attitudes chosen. Statuary at Washington runs too much on
two subjects, which are repeated perhaps almost ad nauseam; one is
that of a stiff, steady-looking, healthy, but ugly individual, with
a square jaw and big jowl, which represents the great General; he
does not prepossess the beholder, because he appears to be thoroughly
ill-natured. And the other represents a melancholy, weak figure
without any hair, but often covered with feathers, and is intended
to typify the red Indian. The red Indian is generally supposed to
be receiving comfort; but it is manifest that he never enjoys the
comfort ministered to him. There is a gigantic statue of Washington,
by Greenough, out in the grounds in front of the building. The figure
is seated and holding up one of its arms towards the city. There is
about it a kind of weighty magnificence; but it is stiff, ungainly,
and altogether without life.
But the front of the original building is certainly grand. The
architect who designed it must have had skill, taste, and nobility of
conception; but even this was spoilt, or rather wasted, by the fact
that the front is made to look upon nothing, and is turned from the
city. It is as though the _façade_ of the London Post-office had been
made to face the Goldsmiths' Hall. The Capitol stands upon the side
of a hill, the front occupying a much higher position than the back;
consequently they who enter it from the back--and everybody does so
enter it--are first called on to rise to the level of the lower floor
by a stiff ascent of exterior steps, which are in no way grand or
imposing, and then, having entered by a mean back-door, are instantly
obliged to ascend again by another flight,--by stairs sufficiently
appropriate to a back entrance, but altogether unfitted for the chief
approach to such a building. It may, of course, be said that persons
who are particular in such matters should go in at the front door and
not at the back; but one must take these things as one finds them.
The entrance by which the Capitol is approached is such as I have
described. There are mean little brick chimneys at the left hand as
one walks in, attached to modern bakeries which have been constructed
in the basement for the use of the soldiers; and there is on
the other hand the road by which waggons find their way to the
underground region with fuel, stationery, and other matters desired
by senators and representatives,--and at present by bakers also.
In speaking of the front I have spoken of it as it was originally
designed and built. Since that period very heavy wings have been
added to the pile;--wings so heavy that they are or seem to be much
larger than the original structure itself. This, to my thinking, has
destroyed the symmetry of the whole. The wings, which in themselves
are by no means devoid of beauty, are joined to the centre by
passages so narrow that from exterior points of view the light can be
seen through them. This robs the mass of all oneness, of all entirety
as a whole, and gives a scattered straggling appearance where there
should be a look of massiveness and integrity. The dome also has been
raised, a double drum having been given to it. This is unfinished
and should not therefore yet be judged; but I cannot think that the
increased height will be an improvement. This again, to my eyes,
appears to be straggling rather than massive. At a distance it
commands attention, and to one journeying through the desert places
of the city gives that idea of Palmyra which I have before mentioned.
Nevertheless, and in spite of all that I have said, I have had
pleasure in walking backwards and forwards, and through the grounds
which lie before the eastern front of the Capitol. The space for the
view is ample, and the thing to be seen has points which are very
grand. If the Capitol were finished and all Washington were built
around it, no man would say that the house in which Congress sat
disgraced the city.
Going west, but not due west, from the Capitol, Pennsylvania Avenue
stretches in a right line to the Treasury Chambers. The distance is
beyond a mile, and men say, scornfully, that the two buildings have
been put so far apart in order to save the Secretaries who sit in
the bureaux from a too rapid influx of members of Congress. This
statement I by no means indorse; but it is undoubtedly the fact that
both senators and representatives are very diligent in their calls
upon gentlemen high in office. I have been present on some such
occasions, and it has always seemed to me that questions of patronage
have been paramount. This reach of Pennsylvania Avenue is the quarter
for the best shops of Washington,--that is to say, the frequented
side of it is so,--that side which is on your right as you leave the
Capitol. Of the other side the world knows nothing. And very bad
shops they are. I doubt whether there be any town in the world at all
equal in importance to Washington, which is in such respects so ill
provided. The shops are bad and dear. In saying this I am guided by
the opinions of all whom I heard speak on the subject. The same thing
was told me of the hotels. Hearing that the city was very full at the
time of my visit--full to overflowing--I had obtained private rooms
through a friend before I went there. Had I not done so, I might have
lain in the streets, or have made one with three or four others in a
small room at some third-rate inn. There had never been so great a
throng in the town. I am bound to say that my friend did well for me.
I found myself put up at the house of one Wormley, a coloured man, in
I Street, to whose attention I can recommend any Englishman who may
chance to want quarters in Washington. He has an hotel on one side of
the street, and private lodging-houses on the other in which I found
myself located. From what I heard of the hotels I conceived myself
to be greatly in luck. Willard's is the chief of these, and the
everlasting crowd and throng of men with which the halls and passages
of the house were always full, certainly did not seem to promise
either privacy or comfort. But then there are places in which
privacy and comfort are not expected,--are hardly even desired,--and
Washington is one of them.
The Post-office and the Patent-office lie a little away from
Pennsylvania Avenue in F Street, and are opposite to each other. The
Post-office is certainly a very graceful building. It is square, and
hardly can be said to have any settled front or any grand entrance.
It is not approached by steps, but stands flush on the ground,
alike on each of the four sides. It is ornamented with Corinthian
pilasters, but is not over ornamented. It is certainly a structure
creditable to any city. The streets around it are all unfinished, and
it is approached through seas of mud and sloughs of despond, which
have been contrived, as I imagine, to lessen, if possible, the
crowd of callers, and lighten in this way the overtasked officials
within. That side by which the public in general were supposed to
approach was, during my sojourn, always guarded by vast mountains of
flour-barrels. Looking up at the windows of the building I perceived
also that barrels were piled within, and then I knew that the
Post-office had become a provision depot for the army. The official
arrangements here for the public were so bad as to be absolutely
barbarous. I feel some remorse in saying this, for I was myself
treated with the utmost courtesy by gentlemen holding high positions
in the office,--to which I was specially attracted by my own
connection with the Post-office in England. But I do not think that
such courtesy should hinder me from telling what I saw that was
bad,--seeing that it would not hinder me from telling what I saw that
was good. In Washington there is but one Post-office. There are no
iron pillars or wayside letter-boxes, as are to be found in other
towns of the Union;--no subsidiary offices at which stamps can be
bought and letters posted. The distances of the city are very great,
the means of transit through the city very limited, the dirt of the
city ways unrivalled in depth and tenacity; and yet there is but one
Post-office. Nor is there any established system of letter-carriers.
To those who desire it, letters are brought out and delivered by
carriers who charge a separate porterage for that service; but
the rule is that letters shall be delivered from the window. For
strangers this is of course a necessity of their position; and I
found that when once I had left instructions that my letters should
be delivered, those instructions were carefully followed. Indeed
nothing could exceed the civility of the officials within;--but so
also nothing can exceed the barbarity of the arrangements without.
The purchase of stamps I found to be utterly impracticable. They
were sold at a window in a corner, at which newspapers were also
delivered, to which there was no regular ingress, and from which
there was no egress. It would generally be deeply surrounded by a
crowd of muddy soldiers, who would wait there patiently till time
should enable them to approach the window. The delivery of letters
was almost more tedious, though in that there was a method. The
aspirants stood in a long line, _en cue_, as we are told by Carlyle
that the bread-seekers used to approach the bakers' shops at Paris
during the Revolution. This "cue" would sometimes project out into
the street. The work inside was done very slowly. The clerk had no
facility, by use of a desk or otherwise, for running through the
letters under the initials denominated, but turned letter by letter
through his hand. To one questioner out of ten would a letter
be given. It no doubt may be said in excuse for this that the
presence of the army round Washington caused at that period special
inconvenience; and that plea should of course be taken, were it
not that a very trifling alteration in the management within would
have remedied all the inconvenience. As a building the Washington
Post-office is very good; as the centre of a most complicated and
difficult department, I believe it to be well managed: but as regards
the special accommodation given by it to the city in which it stands,
much cannot, I think, be said in its favour.
Opposite to that which is, I presume, the back of the Post-office,
stands the Patent-office. This also is a grand building, with a fine
portico of Doric pillars at each of its three fronts. These are
approached by flights of steps, more gratifying to the eye than to
the legs. The whole structure is massive and grand, and, if the
streets round it were finished, would be imposing. The utilitarian
spirit of the nation has, however, done much toward marring the
appearance of the building, by piercing it with windows altogether
unsuited to it, both in number and size. The walls, even under the
porticoes, have been so pierced, in order that the whole space might
be utilized without loss of light; and the effect is very mean. The
windows are small and without ornament,--something like a London
window of the time of George III. The effect produced by a dozen such
at the back of a noble Doric porch, looking down among the pillars,
may be imagined.
In the interior of this building the Minister of the Interior holds
his court, and of course also the Commissioners of Patents. Here is,
in accordance with the name of the building, a museum of models of
all patents taken out. I wandered through it, gazing with listless
eye, now upon this, and now upon that; but to me, in my ignorance,
it was no better than a large toy-shop. When I saw an ancient
dusty white hat, with some peculiar appendage to it which was
unintelligible, it was no more to me than any other old white hat.
But had I been a man of science, what a tale it might have told!
Wandering about through the Patent-office I also found a hospital for
soldiers. A British officer was with me who pronounced it to be, in
its kind, very good. At any rate it was sweet, airy, and large. In
these days the soldiers had got hold of everything.
The Treasury Chambers is as yet an unfinished building. The front
to the south has been completed; but that to the north has not been
built. Here at the north stands as yet the old Secretary of State's
office. This is to come down, and the Secretary of State is to be
located in the new building, which will be added to the Treasury.
This edifice will probably strike strangers more forcibly than any
other in the town, both from its position and from its own character.
It stands with its side to Pennsylvania Avenue, but the avenue here
has turned round, and runs due north and south, having taken a twist,
so as to make way for the Treasury and for the President's house,
through both of which it must run had it been carried straight on
throughout. These public offices stand with their side to the street,
and the whole length is ornamented with an exterior row of Ionic
columns raised high above the footway. This is perhaps the prettiest
thing in the city, and when the front to the north has been
completed, the effect will be still better. The granite monoliths
which have been used, and which are to be used, in this building are
very massive. As one enters by the steps to the south there are two
flat stones, one on each side of the ascent, the surface of each
of which is about 20 feet by 18. The columns are, I think, all
monoliths. Of those which are still to be erected, and which now lie
about in the neighbouring streets, I measured one or two--one which
was still in the rough I found to be 32 feet long by 5 feet broad,
and 4½ deep. These granite blocks have been brought to Washington
from the State of Maine. The finished front of this building, looking
down to the Potomac, is very good; but to my eyes this also has been
much injured by the rows of windows which look out from the building
into the space of the portico.
The President's house--or the White House as it is now called all the
world over--is a handsome mansion fitted for the chief officer of
a great Republic, and nothing more. I think I may say that we have
private houses in London considerably larger. It is neat and pretty,
and with all its immediate outside belongings calls down no adverse
criticism. It faces on to a small garden, which seems to be always
accessible to the public, and opens out upon that everlasting
Pennsylvania Avenue, which has now made another turn. Here in front
of the White House is President's Square, as it is generally called.
The technical name is, I believe, La Fayette Square. The houses round
it are few in number,--not exceeding three or four on each side, but
they are among the best in Washington, and the whole place is neat
and well kept. President's Square is certainly the most attractive
part of the city. The garden of the square is always open, and does
not seem to suffer from any public ill-usage; by which circumstance
I am again led to suggest that the gardens of our London squares
might be thrown open in the same way. In the centre of this one
at Washington, immediately facing the President's house, is an
equestrian statue of General Jackson. It is very bad; but that it
is not nearly as bad as it might be is proved by another equestrian
statue,--of General Washington,--erected in the centre of a small
garden-plat at the end of Pennsylvania Avenue, near the bridge
leading to Georgetown. Of all the statues on horseback which I ever
saw, either in marble or bronze, this is by far the worst and most
ridiculous. The horse is most absurd, but the man sitting on the
horse is manifestly drunk. I should think the time must come when
this figure at any rate will be removed.
I did not go inside the President's house, not having had while
at Washington an opportunity of paying my personal respects to Mr.
Lincoln. I had been told that this was to be done without trouble,
but when I inquired on the subject I found that this was not exactly
the case. I believe there are times when anybody may walk into the
President's house without an introduction; but that, I take it, is
not considered to be the proper way of doing the work. I found that
something like a favour would be incurred, or that some disagreeable
trouble would be given, if I made a request to be presented,--and
therefore I left Washington without seeing the great man.
The President's house is nice to look at, but it is built on marshy
ground, not much above the level of the Potomac, and is very
unhealthy. I was told that all who live there become subject to fever
and ague, and that few who now live there have escaped it altogether.
This comes of choosing the site of a new city, and decreeing that it
shall be built on this or on that spot. Large cities, especially in
these latter days, do not collect themselves in unhealthy places. Men
desert such localities,--or at least do not congregate at them when
their character is once known. But the poor President cannot desert
the White House. He must make the most of the residence which the
nation has prepared for him.
Of the other considerable public building of Washington, called the
Smithsonian Institution, I have said that its style was bastard
Gothic; by this I mean that its main attributes are Gothic, but that
liberties have been taken with it, which, whether they may injure its
beauty or no, certainly are subversive of architectural purity. It is
built of red stone, and is not ugly in itself. There is a very nice
Norman porch to it, and little bits of Lombard Gothic have been well
copied from Cologne. But windows have been fitted in with stilted
arches, of which the stilts seem to crack and bend, so narrow are
they and so high. And then the towers with high pinnacled roofs are a
mistake,--unless indeed they be needed to give to the whole structure
that name of Romanesque which it has assumed. The building is used
for museums and lectures, and was given to the city by one James
Smithson, an Englishman. I cannot say that the city of Washington
seems to be grateful, for all to whom I spoke on the subject hinted
that the Institution was a failure. It is to be remarked that nobody
in Washington is proud of Washington, or of anything in it. If the
Smithsonian Institution were at New York or at Boston, one would have
a different story to tell.
There has been an attempt made to raise at Washington a vast obelisk
to the memory of Washington,--the first in war and first in peace,
as the country is proud to call him. This obelisk is a fair type
of the city. It is unfinished,--not a third of it having as yet
been erected,--and in all human probability ever will remain so. If
finished it would be the highest monument of its kind standing on the
face of the globe,--and yet, after all, what would it be even then as
compared with one of the great pyramids? Modern attempts cannot bear
comparison with those of the old world in simple vastness. But in
lieu of simple vastness, the modern world aims to achieve either
beauty or utility. By the Washington monument, if completed, neither
would be achieved. An obelisk with the proportions of a needle
may be very graceful; but an obelisk which requires an expanse of
flat-roofed, sprawling buildings for its base, and of which the shaft
shall be as big as a cathedral tower, cannot be graceful. At present
some third portion of the shaft has been built, and there it stands.
No one has a word to say for it. No one thinks that money will ever
again be subscribed for its completion. I saw somewhere a box of
plate-glass kept for contributions for this purpose, and looking in
perceived that two half-dollar pieces had been given;--but both of
them were bad. I was told also that the absolute foundation of the
edifice is bad;--that the ground, which is near the river and swampy,
would not bear the weight intended to be imposed on it.
A sad and saddening spot was that marsh, as I wandered down on it all
alone one Sunday afternoon. The ground was frozen and I could walk
dry-shod, but there was not a blade of grass. Around me on all sides
were cattle in great numbers--steers and big oxen--lowing in their
hunger for a meal. They were beef for the army, and never again I
suppose would it be allowed to them to fill their big maws and chew
the patient cud. There, on the brown, ugly, undrained field, within
easy sight of the President's house, stood the useless, shapeless,
graceless pile of stones. It was as though I were looking on the
genius of the city. It was vast, pretentious, bold, boastful with a
loud voice, already taller by many heads than other obelisks, but
nevertheless still in its infancy,--ugly, unpromising, and false. The
founder of the monument had said, Here shall be the obelisk of the
world! and the founder of the city had thought of his child somewhat
in the same strain. It is still possible that both city and monument
shall be completed; but at the present moment nobody seems to believe
in the one or in the other. For myself I have much faith in the
American character, but I cannot believe either in Washington city or
in the Washington monument. The boast made has been too loud, and the
fulfilment yet accomplished has been too small!
Have I as yet said that Washington was dirty in that winter of
1861-1862? Or, I should rather ask, have I made it understood that
in walking about Washington one waded as deep in mud as one does in
floundering through an ordinary ploughed field in November? There
were parts of Pennsylvania Avenue which would have been considered
heavy ground by most hunting-men, and through some of the remoter
streets none but light weights could have lived long. This was the
state of the town when I left it in the middle of January. On my
arrival in the middle of December, everything was in a cloud of
dust. One walked through an atmosphere of floating mud; for the dirt
was ponderous and thick, and very palpable in its atoms. Then came
a severe frost and a little snow; and if one did not fall while
walking, it was very well. After that we had the thaw; and Washington
assumed its normal winter condition. I must say that, during the
whole of this time, the atmosphere was to me exhilarating; but I was
hardly out of the doctor's hands while I was there, and he did not
support my theory as to the goodness of the air. "It is poisoned by
the soldiers," he said, "and everybody is ill." But then my doctor
was perhaps a little tinged with southern proclivities.
On the Virginian side of the Potomac stands a country-house called
Arlington Heights, from which there is a fine view down upon the
city. Arlington Heights is a beautiful spot,--having all the
attractions of a fine park in our country. It is covered with grand
timber. The ground is varied and broken, and the private roads about
sweep here into a dell and then up a brae-side, as roads should do in
such a domain. Below it was the Potomac, and immediately on the other
side stands the city of Washington. Any city seen thus is graceful;
and the white stones of the big buildings when the sun gleams on
them, showing the distant rows of columns, seem to tell something of
great endeavour and of achieved success. It is the place from whence
Washington should be seen by those who wish to think well of the
present city and of its future prosperity. But is it not the case
that every city is beautiful from a distance?
The house at Arlington Heights is picturesque, but neither large
nor good. It has before it a high Greek colonnade, which seems to
be almost bigger than the house itself. Had such been built in a
city,--and many such a portico does stand in cities through the
States,--it would be neither picturesque nor graceful; but here it is
surrounded by timber, and as the columns are seen through the trees,
they gratify the eye rather than offend it. The place did belong,
and as I think does still belong, to the family of the Lees,--if not
already confiscated. General Lee, who is or would be the present
owner, bears high command in the army of the Confederalists, and
knows well by what tenure he holds, or is likely to hold, his family
property. The family were friends of General Washington, whose seat,
Mount Vernon, stands about twelve miles lower down the river; and
here, no doubt, Washington often stood, looking on the site he had
chosen. If his spirit could stand there now and look around upon the
masses of soldiers by which his capital is surrounded, how would it
address the city of his hopes? When he saw that every foot of the
neighbouring soil was desecrated by a camp, or torn into loathsome
furrows of mud by cannon and army waggons,--that agriculture was
gone, and that every effort both of North and South was concentrated
on the art of killing; when he saw that this was done on the very
spot chosen by himself for the centre temple of an everlasting union,
what would he then say as to that boast made on his behalf by his
countrymen that he was first in war and first in peace? Washington
was a great man, and I believe a good man. I, at any rate, will not
belittle him. I think that he had the firmness and audacity necessary
for a revolutionary leader, that he had honesty to preserve him from
the temptations of ambition and ostentation, and that he had the good
sense to be guided in civil matters by men who had studied the laws
of social life and the theories of free government. He was _justus
et tenax propositi_; and in periods that might well have dismayed
a smaller man, he feared neither the throne to which he opposed
himself, nor the changing voices of the fellow-citizens for whose
welfare he had fought. But sixty or seventy years will not suffice to
give to a man the fame of having been first among all men. Washington
did much, and I for one do not believe that his work will perish.
But I have always found it difficult,--I may say impossible,--to
sound his praises in his own land. Let us suppose that a courteous
Frenchman ventures an opinion among Englishmen that Wellington was a
great general, would he feel disposed to go on with his eulogium when
encountered on two or three sides at once with such observations as
the following:--"I should rather calculate he was; about the first
that ever did live or ever will live. Why, he whipped your Napoleon
everlasting whenever he met him. He whipped everybody out of the
field. There warn't anybody ever lived was able to stand nigh him,
and there won't come any like him again. Sir, I guess our Wellington
never had his likes on your side of the water. Such men can't
grow in a down-trodden country of slaves and paupers." Under such
circumstances the Frenchman would probably be shut up. And when I
strove to speak of Washington I generally found myself shut up also.
Arlington Heights, when I was at Washington, was the head-quarters of
General M'Dowell, the General to whom is attributed--I believe most
wrongfully--the loss of the battle of Bull's Run. The whole place was
then one camp. The fences had disappeared. The gardens were trodden
into mud. The roads had been cut to pieces, and new tracks made
everywhere through the grounds. But the timber still remained. Some
no doubt had fallen, but enough stood for the ample ornamentation
of the place. I saw placards up, prohibiting the destruction of the
trees, and it is to be hoped that they have been spared. Very little
in this way has been spared in the country all around.
Mount Vernon, Washington's own residence, stands close over the
Potomac, above six miles below Alexandria. It will be understood that
the capital is on the eastern, or Maryland side of the river, and
that Arlington Heights, Alexandria, and Mount Vernon are in Virginia.
The river Potomac divided the two old colonies, or States as they
afterwards became; but when Washington was to be built, a territory,
said to be ten miles square, was cut out of the two States and was
called the district of Columbia. The greater portion of this district
was taken from Maryland, and on that the city was built. It comprised
the pleasant town of Georgetown, which is now a suburb--and the only
suburb--of Washington. The portion of the district on the Virginian
side included Arlington Heights, and went so far down the river as
to take in the Virginian city of Alexandria. This was the extreme
western point of the district; but since that arrangement was made,
the State of Virginia petitioned to have their portion of Columbia
back again, and this petition was granted. Now it is felt that the
land on both sides of the river should belong to the city, and the
Government is anxious to get back the Virginian section. The city and
the immediate vicinity are freed from all State allegiance, and are
under the immediate rule of the United States Government,--having of
course its own municipality; but the inhabitants have no political
power, as power is counted in the States. They vote for no political
officer, not even for the President, and return no member to
Congress, either as a senator or as a representative. Mount Vernon
was never within the district of Columbia.
When I first made inquiry on the subject I was told that Mount Vernon
at that time was not to be reached;--that though it was not in the
hands of the rebels, neither was it in the hands of Northerners, and
that therefore strangers could not go there; but this, though it
was told to me and others by those who should have known the facts,
was not the case. I had gone down the river with a party of ladies,
and we were opposite to Mount Vernon; but on that occasion we were
assured we could not land. The rebels, we were told, would certainly
seize the ladies, and carry them off into Secessia. On hearing which
the ladies were of course doubly anxious to be landed. But our stern
commander, for we were on a Government boat, would not listen to
their prayers, but carried us instead on board the "Pensacola," a
sloop-of-war which was now lying in the river, ready to go to sea,
and ready also to run the gauntlet of the rebel batteries which lined
the Virginian shore of the river for many miles down below Alexandria
and Mount Vernon. A sloop-of-war in these days means a large
man-of-war, the guns of which are so big that they only stand on
one deck, whereas a frigate would have them on two decks, and a
line-of-battle ship on three. Of line-of-battle ships there will, I
suppose, soon be none, as the "Warrior" is only a frigate. We went
over the "Pensacola," and I must say she was very nice, pretty, and
clean. I have always found American sailors on their men-of-war to
be clean and nice-looking,--as much so I should say as our own; but
nothing can be dirtier, more untidy, or apparently more ill-preserved
than all the appurtenances of their soldiers.
We landed also on this occasion at Alexandria, and saw as melancholy
and miserable a town as the mind of man can conceive. Its ordinary
male population, counting by the voters, is 1500, and of these 700
were in the southern army. The place had been made a hospital for
northern soldiers, and no doubt the site for that purpose had been
well chosen. But let any woman imagine what would be the feelings of
her life while living in a town used as a hospital for the enemies
against whom her absent husband was then fighting! Her own man would
be away ill,--wounded, dying, for what she knew, without the comfort
of any hospital attendance, without physic, with no one to comfort
him; but those she hated, with a hatred much keener than his, were
close to her hand, using some friend's house that had been forcibly
taken, crawling out into the sun under her eyes, taking the bread
from her mouth! Life in Alexandria at this time must have been sad
enough. The people were all secessionists, but the town was held by
the northern party. Through the lines, into Virginia, they could not
go at all. Up to Washington they could not go without a military
pass, not to be obtained without some cause given. All trade was at
an end. In no town at that time was trade very flourishing; but here
it was killed altogether,--except that absolutely necessary trade of
bread. Who would buy boots or coats, or want new saddles, or waste
money on books, in such days as these, in such a town as Alexandria?
And then out of 1500 men, one-half had gone to fight the southern
battles! Among the women of Alexandria secession would have found but
few opponents.
It was here that a hot-brained young man, named Ellsworth, was killed
in the early days of the rebellion. He was a colonel in the northern
volunteer army, and on entering Alexandria found a secession flag
flying at the chief hotel. Instead of sending up a corporal's guard
to remove it, he rushed up and pulled it down with his own hand. As
he descended, the landlord shot him dead, and one of his soldiers
shot the landlord dead. It was a pity that so brave a lad, who had
risen so high, should fall so vainly; but they have made a hero of
him in America;--have inscribed his name on marble monuments, and
counted him up among their great men. In all this their mistake
is very great. It is bad for a country to have no names worthy of
monumental brass; but it is worse for a country to have monumental
brasses covered with names which have never been made worthy of such
honour. Ellsworth had shown himself to be brave and foolish. Let his
folly be pardoned on the score of his courage, and there, I think,
should have been an end of it.
I found afterwards that Mount Vernon was accessible, and I rode
thither with some officers from the staff of General Heintzleman,
whose outside pickets were stationed beyond the old place. I
certainly should not have been well pleased had I been forced to
leave the country without seeing the house in which Washington had
lived and died. Till lately this place was owned and inhabited by
one of the family, a Washington, descended from a brother of the
General's; but it has now become the property of the country, under
the auspices of Mr. Everett, by whose exertions was raised the money
with which it was purchased. It is a long house, of two stories,
built, I think, chiefly of wood, with a verandah, or rather long
portico, attached to the front, which looks upon the river. There are
two wings, or sets of outhouses, containing the kitchen and servants'
rooms, which were joined by open wooden verandahs to the main
building; but one of these verandahs has gone, under the influence of
years. By these a semicircular sweep is formed before the front door,
which opens away from the river, and towards the old prim gardens,
in which, we were told, General Washington used to take much delight.
There is nothing very special about the house. Indeed, as a house, it
would now be found comfortless and inconvenient. But the ground falls
well down to the river, and the timber, if not fine, is plentiful
and picturesque. The chief interest of the place, however, is in the
tomb of Washington and his wife. It must be understood that it was a
common practice throughout the States to make a family burying-ground
in any secluded spot on the family property. I have not unfrequently
come across these in my rambles, and in Virginia I have encountered
small, unpretending gravestones under a shady elm, dated as lately as
eight or ten years back. At Mount Vernon there is now a cemetery of
the Washington family; and there, in an open vault--a vault open, but
guarded by iron grating--is the great man's tomb, and by his side
the tomb of Martha his wife. As I stood there alone, with no one
by to irritate me by assertions of the man's absolute supremacy, I
acknowledged that I had come to the final resting-place of a great
and good man,--of a man whose patriotism was, I believe, an honest
feeling, untinged by any personal ambition of a selfish nature. That
he was pre-eminently a successful man may have been due chiefly to
the excellence of his cause, and the blood and character of the
people who put him forward as their right arm in their contest;
but that he did not mar that success by arrogance, or destroy the
brightness of his own name by personal aggrandisement, is due to a
noble nature and to the calm individual excellence of the man.
Considering the circumstances and history of the place, the position
of Mount Vernon, as I saw it, was very remarkable. It lay exactly
between the lines of the two armies. The pickets of the Northern
army had been extended beyond it, not improbably with the express
intention of keeping a spot so hallowed within the power of the
northern Government. But since the war began it had been in the
hands of the seceders. In fact, it stood there in the middle of the
battle-field, on the very line of division between loyalism and
secession. And this was the spot which Washington had selected as the
heart and centre, and safest rallying homestead of the united nation
which he left behind him. But Washington, when he resolved to found
his capital on the banks of the Potomac, knew nothing of the glories
of the Mississippi. He did not dream of the speedy addition to his
already gathered constellations of those Western stars, of Wisconsin,
Illinois, Minnesota, and Iowa; nor did he dream of Texas conquered,
Louisiana purchased, and Missouri and Kansas rescued from the
wilderness.
I have said that Washington was at that time,--the Christmas of
1861-1862,--a melancholy place. This was partly owing to the
despondent tone in which so many Americans then spoke of their own
affairs. It was not that the northern men thought that they were to
be beaten, or that the southern men feared that things were going bad
with their party across the river; but that nobody seemed to have any
faith in anybody. Maclellan had been put up as the true man--exalted
perhaps too quickly, considering the limited opportunities for
distinguishing himself which fortune had thrown in his way; but now
belief in Maclellan seemed to be slipping away. One felt that it was
so from day to day, though it was impossible to define how or whence
the feeling came. And then the character of the ministry fared still
worse in public estimation. That Lincoln, the President, was honest,
and that Chase, the Secretary of the Treasury, was able, was the only
good that one heard spoken. At this time two Jonahs were specially
pointed out as necessary sacrifices, by whose immersion into the
comfortless ocean of private life the ship might perhaps be saved.
These were Mr. Cameron, the Secretary of War, and Mr. Welles, the
Secretary of the Navy. It was said that Lincoln, when pressed to rid
his Cabinet of Cameron, had replied, that when a man was crossing a
stream the moment was hardly convenient for changing his horse; but
it came to that at last, that he found he must change his horse, even
in the very sharpest run of the river. Better that than sit an animal
on whose exertions he knew that he could not trust. So Mr. Cameron
went, and Mr. Stanton became Secretary at War in his place. But Mr.
Cameron, though put out of the Cabinet, was to be saved from absolute
disgrace by being sent as Minister to Russia. I do not know that
it would become me here to repeat the accusations made against Mr.
Cameron, but it had long seemed to me that the maintenance in such
a position, at such a time, of a gentleman who had to sustain such
a universal absence of public confidence, must have been most
detrimental to the army and to the Government.
Men whom one met in Washington were not unhappy about the state of
things, as I had seen men unhappy in the North and in the West. They
were mainly indifferent, but with that sort of indifference which
arises from a break down of faith in anything. "There was the army!
Yes, the army! But what an army! Nobody obeyed anybody. Nobody did
anything! Nobody thought of advancing! There were, perhaps, two
hundred thousand men assembled round Washington; and now the effort
of supplying them with food and clothing was as much as could be
accomplished! But the contractors, in the meantime, were becoming
rich. And then as to the Government! Who trusted it? Who would put
their faith in Seward and Cameron? Cameron was now gone, it was true;
and in that way the whole of the Cabinet would soon be broken up. As
to Congress, what could Congress do? Ask questions which no one would
care to answer, and finally get itself packed up and sent home." The
President and the constitution fared no better in men's mouths. The
former did nothing,--neither harm nor good; and as for the latter, it
had broken down and shown itself to be inefficient. So men ate, and
drank, and laughed, waiting till chaos should come, secure in the
belief that the atoms into which their world would resolve itself,
would connect themselves again in some other form without trouble on
their part.
And at Washington I found no strong feeling against England and
English conduct towards America. "We men of the world," a Washington
man might have said, "know very well that everybody must take care of
himself first. We are very good friends with you,--of course, and are
very glad to see you at our table whenever you come across the water;
but as for rejoicing at your joys, or expecting you to sympathize
with our sorrows, we know the world too well for that. We are
splitting into pieces, and of course that is gain to you. Take
another cigar." This polite, fashionable, and certainly comfortable
way of looking at the matter had never been attained at New York or
Philadelphia, at Boston or Chicago. The northern provincial world
of the States had declared to itself that those who were not with
it were against it; that its neighbours should be either friends or
foes; that it would understand nothing of neutrality. This was often
mortifying to me, but I think I liked it better on the whole than the
_laisser-aller_ indifference of Washington.
Everybody acknowledged that society in Washington had been almost
destroyed by the loss of the southern half of the usual sojourners in
the city. The senators and members of Government, who heretofore had
come from the southern States, had no doubt spent more money in the
capital than their northern brethren. They and their families had
been more addicted to social pleasures. They are the descendants of
the old English Cavaliers, whereas the northern men have come from
the old English Roundheads. Or if, as may be the case, the blood
of the races has now been too well mixed to allow of this being
said with absolute truth, yet something of the manners of the old
forefathers has been left. The southern gentleman is more genial,
less dry,--I will not say more hospitable, but more given to enjoy
hospitality than his northern brother; and this difference is quite
as strong with the women as with the men. It may therefore be
understood that secession would be very fatal to the society of
Washington. It was not only that the members of Congress were not
there. As to very many of the representatives, it may be said that
they do not belong sufficiently to Washington to make a part of its
society. It is not every representative that is, perhaps, qualified
to do so. But secession had taken away from Washington those who
held property in the South--who were bound to the South by any ties,
whether political or other; who belonged to the South by blood,
education, and old habits. In very many cases--nay, in most such
cases--it had been necessary that a man should select whether he
would be a friend to the South, and therefore a rebel; or else an
enemy to the South, and therefore untrue to all the predilections and
sympathies of his life. Here has been the hardship. For such people
there has been no neutrality possible. Ladies even have not been able
to profess themselves simply anxious for peace and goodwill, and so
to remain tranquil. They who are not for me are against me, has been
spoken by one side and by the other. And I suppose that in all civil
war it is necessary that it should be so. I heard of various cases
in which father and son had espoused different sides in order that
property might be retained both in the North and in the South. Under
such circumstances it may be supposed that society in Washington
would be considerably cut up. All this made the place somewhat
melancholy.