of its smooth, broad avenues and pretty little parks, with the
bronze statues which all looked noble--in the moonlight; it was such a
combination and piquant contrast of shabby ease and stately elegance
--negro cabins and stone mansions, picket-fences and sheds, and
flower-banked terraces before rows of residences which bespoke wealth and
refinement. The very aspect of the street population was novel; compared
to New York, the city was as silent as a country village, and the
passers, who have the fashion of walking in the middle of the street upon
the asphalt as freely as upon the sidewalks, had a sort of busy
leisureliness, the natural air of thousands of officials hived in offices
for a few hours and then left in irresponsible idleness. But what most
distinguished the town, after all, in Margaret's first glimpse of it, was
the swarming negro population pervading every part of it--the slouching
plantation negro, the smart mulatto girl with gay raiment and mincing
step, the old-time auntie, the brisk waiter-boy with uncertain eye, the
washerwoman, the hawkers and fruiterers, the loafing strollers of both
sexes--carrying everywhere color, abandon, a certain picturesqueness and
irresponsibility and good-nature, and a sense of moral relaxation in a
too strict and duty-ridden world.

In the morning, when Margaret looked from the windows of the hotel, the
sky was gray and yielding, and all the outlines of the looming buildings
were softened in the hazy air. The dome of the Capitol seemed to float
like a bubble, and to be as unsubstantial as the genii edifices in the
Arabian tale. The Monument, the slim white shaft as tall as the Great
Pyramid, was still more a dream creation, not really made of hard marble,
but of something as soft as vapor, almost melting into the sky, and yet
distinct, unwavering, its point piercing the upper air, threatening every
instant to dissolve, as if it were truly the baseless fabric of a vision
--light, unreal, ghost-like, spotless, pure as an unsullied thought; it
might vanish in a breath; and yet, no; it is solid: in the mist of doubt,
in the assault of storms, smitten by the sun, beaten by the tempests, it
stands there, springing, graceful, immovable--emblem, let us say, of the
purity and permanence of the republic.

"You never half told me, Rodney, how beautiful it all is!" Margaret
exclaimed, in a glow of delight.

"Yes," said Henderson, "the Monument is behaving very well this morning.
I n