A GLANCE AT WASHINGTON.

HAVE no means of judging what Washington may look like in sunny weather; sleet and rain having combined on my visit there, for a "spell" of the most detestable weather ever encountered by a traveller. The streets were a quaking jelly of mud, filled with a motley procession of dirt-incrusted army-wagons, drawn by wretched-looking horses, the original color of whose hide was known only to their owners. Military men swarmed on the sidewalks, gossipped on the steps of public buildings, filled hotel entries, parlors and dining-rooms, and splashed through mud-puddles with a recklessness born of camp-initiation. To escape from wet sidewalks into street-cars was to wade to them literally ankle-deep in mud-jelly. To the resolute, however, all things are possible; especially when millinery and dry-goods are counted as naught; I went there to see what was to be seen, and I saw it.

The night before I visited the Capitol there came a heavy fall of snow; the long avenues of trees leading to it looked very beautiful, bending under their pure white burden, or tossing it lightly off, as the wind swept by. Every garden seat had a round white cushion, every statue a snow-crown. No art of man could have improved upon this festal adorning of nature. The "prospect from the dome" we had to take, by faith, more's the pity, the snow-king having drawn a veil over it. Of course I stared about the Rotunda, like my betters. As I have never "been abroad," I suppose I am not entitled to an opinion upon the pictures I saw there; but it did strike me that De Soto, the discoverer of the Mississippi River, who travelled through the wilderness for that purpose, thousands of miles, exposed to all dangers and weathers; who lost cattle and men by fatigue and famine, and was otherwise harassed to the verge of dissolution, could not, at the moment, when success crowned his efforts, have been found in a rich crimson jacket with slashed Spanish sleeves, and silk stockings drawn over well-rounded calves, and an immaculate head of hair, looking as if it had just emerged from a fashionable barber's shop. I say it struck me so, but then I'm "only a woman," and have never been to Italy. It struck me also that their rags, and their dirt, and their uncombed locks, and their jaded horses, would have looked quite as picturesque, and had the added advantage of being true to nature. It occurred to me also that some of the horses of the victorious generals in the other pictures were very impossible animals, but that may be owing to some defect in my early education. I could not help thinking that our great-great-great-grand children might possibly wish that we had left the art-selection to themselves. It won't matter much to us then, however.

How patriotic I felt when I stood on the floor of the Senate! A minute more, and I should have forgotten my bonnet, and made a speech myself. It might not have been "in order," but I think it would have been listened to while it lasted, though when my enthusiasm was over, I should probably have collapsed into shamefaced consciousness, very much as do the restored breathers of "the laughing gas." I never heard a more eloquent or appropriate prayer than was offered at the opening of the Senate, that day, by a clergyman, whose name I did not learn. Years ago, and what clergyman would have dared utter such bold words in such a place? There were no speeches made that morning; and there was no need; the place itself was inspiration. My breath came quick as I looked about me.

As to the "White House," I have no doubt that the upholstery and carpets are all right—also the chandeliers. For myself I coveted the green-house and garden, and the fine piazza at the back of the house, with its view of Arlington Heights and the white tents of the encampment in the distance. The "East Room," with its Parisian carpet, would have astonished the ghost of Mrs. John Adams, who used to dry her clothes there, when it was in an unfinished state. How very strange it looked to see sentinels on duty before the doors; one realizes that there "is war," when in Washington and its surroundings, where railroad gates and public buildings are guarded, and at every few miles of road up starts a sentinel, and camps are so plentiful that one ceases to regard them with a curious eye.

After walking through the Patent Office at Washington, I had several reflections. First, a feeling of thankfulness that our innocent ancestors died without knowing how uncomfortable they were,—minus these modern improvements. Secondly, how many heads must have ached, hatching out the ideas there practically perfected. Thirdly, did the real inventors themselves reap any reward, pecuniary or otherwise, or, having died "making an effort," did some charlatan, with more money than brains, filch their discovery and, attaching his name to it, secure both fame and gold?

Leaving these vexed questions unsettled, the place is of rare interest even to the ordinary curiosity-hunter, destitute either of philosophical or mechanical proclivities. Looking at General Washington's relics, one cannot but be struck with the simple tastes of that time. The plates, knives and chairs, which formed part of his household furniture, would—apart from their associations—be sniffed at in any fashionable mansion of the present day. And as to his camp-chest and writing-desk, every mother's 1862-pet, whose budding moustache is half demolished by parting kisses, is provided with a better as he goes to "the war." And Washington's coat, waistcoat and breeches are of a fabric so coarse, that our present officials would decline wearing the like except under compulsion. The same may be said of the coat worn by the immortal General Jackson; at the mention of whose name I will forever remove my bonnet, for his unswerving loyalty toward, and manly defence of, his zealously slandered wife. Alas for some of the pluck and spirit that animated the sometime wearers of those faded old military clothes. But it is too aggravating a theme; though I did linger over those military buttons, with divers little thoughts which I should like to have whispered into the President's ear, and which, if properly carried out, would no doubt save this nation!

As to the fifteen flashy silk robes presented by the Japanese government to ours, I had no desire to get into them. A strange soldier standing near while I was gazing, stepped up, and with camp frankness said to me: "now I suppose, being a lady, you can form some idea of the value of those things." "Oh, yes," said I, "they are like the bonnets of to-day, expensive in proportion to their ugliness." Penetrated by the wisdom of my reply, he answered feelingly, "Just so,"—and touching his cap, passed on. Among General Washington's relics I saw a cane presented to him by Franklin, and a chandelier presented to Washington by some French magnate, so awkward, inferior and crude, compared with the splendid affairs of the present day, that one compassionately wishes, for the donor's sake, that his name were withheld. I saw also, under glass, the original treaties of several foreign nations, French and others, with our government. The autographic signatures of great potentates, yellow with time, was suggestive. The models of steam-engines, revolvers, torpedoes, mowing-machines and excavators, were "too many for me;" I might have looked wise over them, to be sure, like other folks, but had I stood staring till the millennium I couldn't have comprehended them, so where was the use of shamming? I just said, that's not in my line, and inspected the different varieties of hoop-skirts; and though the masculine mind may not recognize the fact, the perfection to which those things have arrived by gradual stages is comforting to contemplate. I say "comforting" advisedly; because if one must drag round so many yards of dry goods, a cage is better adapted to hang them on than the human hips. It is my opinion that notwithstanding the torrent of abuse to which the hoop is and has been subjected, it will never be dropped—save at bed-time.

It is a melancholy affair to visit public institutions that have sprung from the legacies of wealthy persons, so often do they fail to carry out the philanthropic results so enthusiastically programmed by the donors. This reflection seemed to me not out of place when leaving the Smithsonian Institute in Washington. The building itself is fine, and favorably located, and the grounds about it very attractive; but dust-covered statues, cobwebs, and a general and indescribable air of inefficiency in the interior, were painfully palpable, and stood as a type of other posthumous charities which have come under my notice. In fact, "wills" oftener turn out, "wonts" than one imagines, codiciled and guarded as they may be by the best human ingenuity and foresight. Snakes are not the only wriggling animals, and dead men are happy in not being able to return to their old haunts. Some of the pictured celebrities in the place would have leaped from their frames, had they heard the irreverent bystanders, who were "doing" the lions, asking who they were, and gaping at the guide-book recital of their greatness and goodness, from some companion; or turning an indifferent joke, in the middle of the narration, upon the cut of the pictured coat, or hair, or beard. It was an excellent comment upon the wearing, toil and fret of ambition, which eats the heart out of life, and often sets aside everything worth living for, to gain—a name. The collection of animals there would be interesting doubtless to the naturalist; but we often wonder who but he, could take pleasure in bottled snakes, sprawling, impaled bugs, and stuffed monkeys and baboons. As to the latter, they are too painful a burlesque upon human beings, to be regarded with complacency. Their horrible and fiendish exaggeration of some faces, which all of us have, once or more, in our lives met, is anything but agreeable. The collection of stuffed birds in this place is exquisitely beautiful. One lingers there, oblivious of wide-mouthed, hungry-looking bears, standing on their hind legs, or grinning skulls of Indians, or other delightful monstrosities. These brilliant birds, orange with black wings, or scarlet wings with black bodies, or drab with bright little heads, or with the whole body of the loveliest blue, were beautiful as the most brilliant hued bouquet. So perfectly were they prepared and mounted, that one waited expectant for a sweet trill, or an upward flight. There was also a very curious and pretty exhibition of bird's eggs, of every size and color, some of them "cuddled" comfortably in little nests. I would have agreed to leave to the Institution the numerous and precious volumes of "De Bow's Review" which graced it, for the liberty of appropriating those bright birds and those pretty eggs.

One feature in the place was quite novel. Specimens framed under glass of the hair of some of the Presidents of the United States. Either these gentlemen were not liberally endowed with this commodity, or inveterate lion-hunters had taught them a niggardly caution on the distribution of this article, in view of baldness or a future wig; for under the names of some of them were only four or six hairs. Most of them were white or grey; suggestive of rather equivalent repose, for the craniums from whence they sprang. Of course, one's organ of reverence would not admit in this case the possibility of the trick adopted by "pestered" celebrities—attacked in the hair—viz: wickedly substituting something else for the original coveted article. Of course not! As to the soldiers and military men passing through Washington, they must be pleased to know how comfortably they can be "embalmed," should a chance shot render it necessary. Large signs to this effect, conspicuously placed, and running the whole length of a block, stare them remindingly in the face, at every turn. As to Jackson's equestrian statue, fronting the President's house, I opine that nobody but General Jackson could have sat on a horse's back in that rearing condition, without slipping backward over the tail. However, one forgives everything to an admirer of General Jackson; and the sculptor evidently had strong faith in his omnipotence, as well as in the wonderful upward, danger-defying curve of his unique horse's tail!