the Potomac, and about two miles
from it, on the Virginian side, is Arlington, the seat of Mr.
Custis, who is the grandson of General Washington's wife. It is
a noble looking place, having a portico of stately white columns,
which, as the mansion stands high, with a background of dark
woods, forms a beautiful object in the landscape. At George Town
is a nunnery, where many young ladies are educated, and at a
little distance from it, a college of Jesuits for the education
of young men, where, as their advertisements state, "the
humanities are taught." We attended mass at the chapel of the
nunnery, where the female voices that performed the chant were
very pleasing. The shadowy form of the veiled abbess in her
little sacred parlour, seen through a grating and a black
curtain, but rendered clearly visible by the light of a Gothic
window behind her, drew a good deal of our attention; every act
of genuflection, even the telling her beads, was discernible, but
so mistily that it gave her, indeed, the appearance of a being
who had already quitted this life, and was hovering on the
confines of the world of shadows.

The convent has a considerable inclosure attached to it, where I
frequently saw from the heights above it, dark figures in awfully
thick black veils, walking solemnly up and down.

The American lady, who was the subject of one of Prince
Hohenlohe's celebrated miracles, was pointed out to us at
Washington. All the world declare that her recovery was
marvellous.

There appeared to be a great many foreigners at Washington,
particularly French. In Paris I have often observed that it was
a sort of fashion to speak of America as a new Utopia, especially
among the young liberals, who, before the happy accession of
Philip, fancied that a country without a king, was the land of
promise; but I sometimes thought that, like many other fine
things, it lost part of its brilliance when examined too nearly;
I overheard the following question and answer pass between two
young Frenchmen, who appeared to have met for the first time.

"Eh bien. Monsieur, comment trouvez-vous la liberte et l'egalite
mises en action?"

"Mais, Monsieur, je vous avoue que ie beau ideal que nous autres,
nous avons concu de tout cela a Paris, avait quelque chose de
plus poetique que ce que nous trouvons ici!"

On another occasion I was excessively amused by the tone in
which one of these young men replied to a question put to him
by ano