The Washington National Monument, so long a truncated column of 174 feet in height, was commenced in 1848 by an association incorporated by Congress. After an expenditure of $230,000, raised by voluntary subscription, the monument came to a stand-still for twenty years. By act of Congress passed in 1876, appropriating the sum of $200,000, this monument is to be finished, and will form a lofty and imposing plain obelisk, 70 feet square at the base, and 470 feet high. It is constructed of great blocks of crystal Maryland marble, lined with blue gneiss stone, and while simple and majestic in form, without attempt at ornament, wilk constitute a mausoleum that will last for ages, erected by the people of the whole country to its greatest citizen, on a scale worthy of the nation.

The cemeteries of Washington are not numerous. The Congressional Cemetery, located on the banks of the Anacostia, one mile east from the Capitol, embraces 30 acres. It has about 200 square cenotaphs of freestone, erected to the memory of members of Congress who have died in Washington, and contains also the graves of many distinguished officials and citizens. Oak Hill Cemetery, on Georgetown Heights, is the most attractive and beautiful place of sepulture about Washington, occupying the undulating hills above Rock Creek, and thickly planted with noble forest trees and shrubbery. Glenwood Cemetery, at the extremity of Lincoln Avenue, north of the city, and Rock Creek Cemetery, near the Soldiers' Home, with Mount Olivet, are the principal other cemeteries. The Soldiers' Home, a national institution for the invalid soldiers of the regular army, was established in 1851 by a purchase of 200 acres three miles north of the Capitol, with a sum of money levied by Gen. Scott on the city of Mexico. It has been more than doubled in extent of grounds, and is kept up by a fund derived from retaining 12 cents a month from the pay of each private in the army. The buildings are handsome and costly, and the grounds, laid out in meadows, groves, and lakes, afford seven miles of beautiful drives, serving as a free public park for the city of Washington. At the Soldiers' Home, President Lincoln and some of his predecessors were wont to find relaxation during the heated term of summer.

Of minor public buildings erected by the government, may be mentioned the Naval Hospital, a handsome edifice at the corner of Ninth and Pennsylvania Avenue East; the Columbia Institution for the Deaf and Dumb, founded 1857, with its picturesque semi-Gothic buildings, occupying 100 acres at Kendall Green, and accommodating 100 pupils; the Government Hospital for the Insane (opened 1855), a commodious structure on the crest of hills on the east bank of the Anacostia, opposite Washington, with 419 acres and 600 patients, belonging to the army and navy and the District of Columbia; and the Reform School of the District of Columbia (150 acres), established in 1871, on the Bladensburg turnpike, three miles from the Capitol.

Charitable institutions abound in Washington, and many of them have received continuous or occasional aid from the Treasury by act of Congress. The principal ones are Providence Hospital, a large edifice on Capitol Hill, accommodating 200 patients; the Louise Home, a fine building on Massachusetts Avenue, erected and endowed by W. W. Corcoran in 1871 for indigent gentlewomen; the Columbia Hospital for Women; the National Soldiers' and Sailors' Orphans' Home; the Washington Orphan Asylum; St. Joseph's and St. Vincent's Orphan Asylums; St. John's Hospital for Children; the Freedman's Hospital, and the Home for the Aged, under the care of the Little Sisters of the Poor.

The markets of Washington are profusely supplied with all the products of the soil and of the waters, the best qualities of meats, and the finest game, at low rates. The two principal markets are the Central, erected in 1870, an ornate structure of brick on Pennsylvania Avenue, between Seventh and Ninth streets, and the Northern Liberty Market, running from K to L streets, on Fifth, erected in 1874.

The water supply of Washington is brought by a capacious aqueduct from the Great Falls of the Potomac, sixteen miles above the city. It affords a daily supply of 80,000,000 gallons to the reservoir, the consumption, however, only reaching 23,000,000 gallons per diem. The aqueduct cost $3,500,000. The public parks and squares are well supplied with fountains, none of which, however, are of remarkable size or artistic beauty.

Washington is connected with the Virginia shore by three bridges across the Potomac. The Long Bridge, which has a track for the Washington and Alexandria Railroad, and a carriage-way for vehicles and pedestrians, is laid on piers. The Aqueduct Bridge at Georgetown is the only toll bridge in the District. The Chain Bridge at Little Falls, four miles above, has given place to an iron truss bridge erected in 1874. Across the Eastern Branch, or Anacostia, runs the Navy Yard Bridge, an iron structure erected in 1875; and Benning's Bridge, of wood, lies about a mile above the Navy Yard.

One of the most conspicuous and imposing edifices at the national capital is the Smithsonian Institution, located on the Mall. It is constructed of dark red sandstone, in the rounded Norman or Romanesque style of architecture, from designs by Renwick, and forms by far the most picturesque public edifice in Washington. This elegant building is the repository of the National Museum, and of all objects of art, natural history, geology, etc., belonging to the government, and is the centre of international and scientific exchanges of great magnitude and value, while its numerous publications are recognized as important contributions to science throughout the world. Its fine scientific library was removed to the Capitol in 1866, and forms an adjunct to the Library of Congress.

There are several colleges or universities, the chief of which are Columbian University, with its law and medical department, and preparatory school of over 100 pupils; Gonzaga College (Roman Catholic); Howard University for colored youth; and the law school of the National University.

Five daily newspapers and twelve weekly periodicals, with several monthlies, are issued ; but as yet the capital possesses no journal of first-rate power and importance to the country, the local papers being overshadowed by the keen competition of the metropolitan press.

As the political capital of the United States, Washington enjoys a distinction to which no other metropolis, however extensive its population, commerce, shipping, or manufactures, can lay claim. The vast and varied interests connected with the legislation for a people of 45,000,000, now embracing 38 States and 9 Territories, draw to Washington an annually increasing number of citizens from motives of interest or curiosity; while its mild and salubrious climate in the winter season renders it an attractive resort for persons of wealth and leisure from all quarters. The society of Washington is marked by a degree of freedom and liberality of intercourse such as prevails in scarcely any other city in the Union. While the vast majority of the population is distinctively American, the presence of travellers and sojourners from all parts of the world, and the residence of the diplomatic corps, representing foreign nations, render the society cosmopolitan in the best sense of the term. The open

ing of the fashionable season is nearly coincident with the opening of Congress on the first Monday in December. From that time until the Lenten holidays, there is a constant succession of receptions, balls, dinners, etc., invitations to which are freely distributed; while the partly official, partly social receptions, termed levees, given by the President, the members of the cabinet, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, are open to all comers. The President receives the calls of the public daily from 12 to 3 P.M., except on Sundays and cabinet days, Tuesdays and Fridays. New Year's Reception at the White House is attended by foreign ministers in their official costumes, by the officers of the army and navy in full uniform, and by officers of the government, Senators and Representatives, and the public generally.

The chief places of amusement are Ford's Opera House, corner of Louisiana Avenue and Ninth Street, and the National Theatre. There are several public halls, where concerts and lectures are of frequent occurrence during the season. The principal hotels are the Arlington, Riggs House, Ebbitt House, Willard's, the National, and the Metropolitan. Washington has 120 church edifices, few of which are remarkable for architectural beauty, divided between fifteen different religious denominations. Nearly all parts of the

city and of Georgetown are accessible by street cars, there being ten street railway companies and branches in active operation.

Washington is to a great extent a city of boarding-houses, and thousands of its citizens depend upon the rental of apartments, etc., for a portion of their incomes. The number of officers and clerks in government employ is nearly 5000, and, as most of these have families, there is an extensive local market for goods and commodities of all kinds, which is met by a large and excellent variety of stores and merchandise.

During the civil war of 1861-65, Washington was the centre of military operations of prodigious magnitude. On the return of peace and the assured restoration of the Union, confidence in the future revived, and Washington, which had been so long retarded by the incubus of war, began to extend its growth by the erection of multitudes of new buildings, and other evidences of prosperity. From this period may be said to date that new Washington, which, with its magnificent public improvements and multitude of private edifices of taste and elegance, has taken the place of the mean little village which but a few years ago appeared so unworthy the capital of a great nation. There were erected in 1875 nearly 1400 new buildings, at a cost of about $3,500,000, and in 1876, 1160 houses.

The environs of Washington abound in natural beauties, which need only the hand of wealth and taste to render them more attractive than those of any other American city. Favorite drives out of town take the visitor to Soldiers' Home, whence an enchanting view of city, river, and hilly landscape is unrolled; to Rock Creek Valley, notable for its picturesque wildness and wealth of flowers and forest trees; to the heights above Georgetown, by the splendid driveway of K Street and Connecticut Avenue, climbing hills which command the widest and most impressive prospect in the District of Columbia; and to Arlington Heights, on the Virginia shore, with its city of the dead containing 15,000 Union soldiers' graves, and its lovely views down and across the Potomac to where the Capitol lifts its airy dome into the eastern sky.

The question whether it is good policy to build up a great city expressly for a seat of government is not now an open one. Washington has been built, and was laid out by the fathers of the republic on a scale of greatness commensurate with the permanent wants of a capital for a populous and powerful nation, destined to hold a front rank in civilization. The question of the removal of the seat of government westward, or nearer to the present or prospective centre of the country, is no longer agitated. The present capital, with its storied memories, founded by the first President, whose name it bears, is felt to be a worthy centre of the political union of a great people, symbolized by the inscription engraved on the dome of the Capitol, "E pluribus unum.”

THE ELECTORAL SYSTEM OF CHOOSING

THE PRESIDENT.

HISTORY OF ITS ORIGIN.

It appears from Mr. Madison's invaluable Report of the Debates on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, that in the first scheme of government submitted to the Convention, by Edmund Randolph, of Virginia, the Electoral system of choosing the President had uo place. On the contrary, by the seventh article of Mr. Randolph's plan, it was " resolved that a National Executive be instituted, to be chosen by the National Legislature, for the term of

years." On the same day, May 29th, 1787, Mr. Charles Pinckney, of South Carolina, submitted" the draft of a Federal Government " which he had prepared. In Mr. Pinckney's plan, while the members of the Senate of the United States were to be chosen by the House of Delegates (i.e., of Representatives), the Representatives were to be chosen by the people under State regulations; but the mode of electing the President was not defined. When these schemes for a government came up for consideration, the greatest difference of opinion was revealed as to the mode of electing the Chief Executive. Mr. James Wilson, of Pennsylvania, declared himself first and last in favor of an election of President by the people. Experience in the States, ¡ said he, had shown that the election of a First Magistrate by the people at large was both convenient and successful. The objects of choice in such cases must be persons whose merits had general notcriety.

Roger Sherman, of Connecticut, was for the appointment of President by the Legislature (i.e., Congress), and was for making him absolutely dependent on that body, as it was the will of that which was to be executed.

The next day Mr. Wilson repeated his arguments in favor of an election by the people, and submitted the first germ of the Electoral system subsequently adopted, in the following amendment :

"That the States shall be divided into

districts, and that per