Such is a brief sketch of the Congressional action which led to the establishment of the existing Capital, and of the attempts which have been made to remove it. In making this compilation, we have resorted to Hildreth's "History of the United States," to Force's "Picture of Washington," and to a valuable letter of George Alfred Townsend, in the Chicago "Tribune" of October 19, 1869.

The sums which have been voted, at various times, to defray the expenses of erecting public buildings, amount, we believe, to about forty millions of dollars. Some of these edifices are nearly architecturally faultless, such as the Post Office, the Patent Office, the Treasury, and the Capitol, except that the body of most of them is built of a perishable sandstone from Aquia Creek, which is protected by numerous coats of white lead, and therefore is in glaring contrast with the marble or granite which forms the wings. The Smithsonian Institute is the folly of Robert Dale Owen, and, in the structure, every principle of airiness and convenience is sacrificed to external appearance. The Washington Monument, whose managers have resorted to every device, but in vain, to levy contributions on the people of the United States, is another stupendous folly. Built of "Texas" marble, its base will crumble before the cap-stone is laid. The more durable materials which enter into these structures were brought from a distance of four or five hundred miles-from the hills of Berkshire and the sea-coast quarries of Maine and Massachusetts. Perhaps, in the event of the removal of the Capital, it would do to take apart the blocks and convey them to the new site.

We come now to the question, Ought the Capital to be removed? We answer emphatically, YES!

The capital of a great empire should be in a central position, secure from

"the

attack, surrounded by a population which represents the loyalty, the virtue, and strength, of the nation. It should be, to quote the language used by Mr. Jackson in debate before cited, as heart in the human body-the center from which the principles of life are carried to the extremes, and from these again return with precision."

The influences brought to bear upon those who are entrusted with the administration of affairs, should emanate not from a particular class, or in a particular section, but from the great body of the people. Paris is France, but London is not England. The present Washington is Wall street; but let us hope that in the heart of the continent there may arise a new Washington, which shall be the reflex of the sober virtues and the substantial industry of the great mass of the people.

Let us see how far the position of the present Capital fulfills these conditions. It is not secure against attack; for, once in its history, it has been sacked and fired by a foreign enemy, and during the Rebellion a large army was required to protect it against a domestic foe. Instead of being in the heart of the Republic, it is at the extreme verge of a territory three thousand miles in breadth. Instead of being readily accessible, it can be approached from the North only over a single line of railway, whose capacity during the war was taxed to the utmost, and whose line required a large army to guard. Its climate is far from genial. Winter is the season of profuse rains, without sufficient cold to consolidate them into ice and snow, and hence the roads become almost impassable; while the scorching heats of summer dry up the grasses of the fields. To the large body of officials who are compelled to reside there, the protracted heats are as depressing as those of the tropics. The miasms generated from the marshes of the Potomac, and the sewage

poured into the big ditch dignified with the name of "The Canal," are prolific in fevers and agues, and the "White House," during the warm months, is deserted by the President.

It has no resident population of men who have retired from the active pursuits of business, to live a life of generous hospitality, or of men who would pursue a life of learned research; and the character of the society, apart from such as is to be found among those who have an official residence, or are there as visitors, is hollow and superficial. While the public buildings have an impressive grandeur, the private buildings are contemptible-as though diamonds were set in pinchbeck; but they subserve the purposes of their erection, viz.: shops, restaurants, and boardinghouses. Perhaps there is no city where the contrast between opulence and poverty is so marked; where the government lavishes its wealth so liberally, and where the individual doles it out so niggardly.

The surroundings are far from attractive; no handsome villas, with graveled walks, trimmed hedges, shrubbery, orchards, and greensward. The soil, never rich, has become exhausted by repeated croppings, without having been restored by any fertilizing principle. There are few or no vegetable gardens to supply the wants of a great city; and hence the Washington markets are the poorest in the country. The exhausted soil supports, in many places, a growth of scrubby pine, and in others stretches out in barren wastes.

But there are moral and political considerations not to be overlooked. As the chameleon takes the hue of the object on which it rests, so they who administer the government are instinctively influenced by local associations. They mistake the opinions of those who, by geographical position, have ready access to the Capital, for the great popular sentiment. A local in

fluence is created which is all-powerful. The history of Washington City illustrates the truth of this remark. When, in 1789, the North consented to remove the Capital to the banks of the Potomac, she resorted to a most effectual method to surrender up the government to the control of the slaye-power. Hedged in between Maryland and Virginia, the Capital became essentially a Southern city. The tone of its society, the habits of the people, and their mode of expression, were essentially Southern. As, in approaching a large manufacturing city, a dense cloud of smoke is seen enveloping it like a pall, long before the towers and spires are visible, so over Washington, before the Rebellion, there hung an atmosphere which, to the Northern man, was noxious. Men who, before their constituents, exhibited a fair degree of manhood, when brought into the presence of the slave-power, stood quailed and dumb, or spoke of the "institution" with "bated breath and whispering humbleness." Otherwise, social position, which every man values, and political preferment, which nearly every man aspires to, were denied him. There was never, perhaps, in any community, an ostracism so rigorous and inexorable as that exercised when Mason, Toombs, and Brooks, held sway in Congress. It reached from the President down through all grades of Washington society. When Sumner was stricken down on the floor of the Senate by a dastardly blow, there was hardly a resident of the District who had the manhood to protest against the outrage.

Happily, these malign influences have passed away forever. But there are other influences to which we will advert. So long as the Capital remains where it is, the people of the Mississippi Valley will be excluded from their just influence in the administration of the government. The commercial cities of the sea-board will dictate its policy.

"Those who are always most adjacent to the seat of legislation," said Mr. Madison, "will always possess advantages over others." The money power of Wall street, the commercial power of the Chamber of Commerce of New York, and the tariff interests of New England and Pennsylvania, are always represented by "lobbyists," ready to mold legislation to suit their views. "There are no committees," said Senator Allen, "from the banks of the Mississippi, the Missouri, or even the Ohio," to claim special privileges. "Fifteen hours" (he might have said, had the telegraph been in use when the sentiment was uttered, fifteen minutes) "after a bill is introduced, Wall street has knowledge of it," and a delegation is on its way to regulate its details. "The great mass of the people live on the soil-four-fifths of them,—and it is in the center that the seat of government should be located."

The commercial interests of the Great Lakes, the agricultural interests of the Mississippi Valley, and the mining interests of the Pacific Slope, are quite as worthy of recognition as the interests to which we have adverted. Would it not be quite as commendable on the part of the Secretary of the Treasury to liberate currency to aid in the movement of Western crops to the sea-board, as to sell gold to break the power of an infamous ring in Wall street?

This gambling in public and private securities, by which the earnings of patient labor are wiped out in a twinkling, this special legislation in aid of private interests, this conforming of the policy of the government to suit individual views, is the bane and curse of modern society; and it is our belief that the removal of the Capital into the midst of an agricultural population would exert a wholesome influence.

Under the next apportionment of representation, the political power of this nation, for all time, will be trans

ferred to the Mississippi Valley. The conditions of soil and climate, and the slight obstacles to intercommunication over vast areas, all concur to develop here a homogeneous people. Their political power will enable them to dictate the policy of the government, and their virtue and intelligence will be the standard by which the virtue and intelligence of the nation are to be rated. As the first example of the exercise of that power, let the Capital be removed. It will be an act of emancipation from a thralldom which has too long fettered the West, and deprived her people of their due political influence.

The bluffs of the Upper Mississippi afford many sites admirably fitted for a nation's Capital. That river is the great geognostic feature of the continent-the dividing line between what now forms the East and the West, and nearly midway between the Gulf and the northern limit of cultivable land. Such a position would accommodate the extremes of the Republic. It would be the point where the trav eler from the Pacific Coast would first be inclined to pause, and also the traveler from the Atlantic, before he took his departure Westward. climate of the region is invigorating, and the soil productive. In a Capital situated in the heart of the Food-producing States, the cost of living would never be exorbitantly high. The materials for construction, such as stone, lime, brick, and lumber, and the useful ores and minerals, such as coal, iron, lead, and copper, are abundant, and readily accessible by land and water conveyance.

The

The cost of building up a new Capitol is insignificant, when that cost will be apportioned among one hundred millions of people. If the States of Iowa and Illinois were to grant to the United States an area of ten miles square, embracing both banks of the Mississippi, for the purposes of found

ing a Capital, the moment the act was consummated, the enhanced value communicated to the property would more than pay all the costs of removal and reconstruction.

When Constantine transferred from Rome to Constantinople the seat of empire, it was found that population at once concentrated around the new capital, and before the lapse of a century

it rivaled the old capital in the extent and grandeur of the buildings, and in the number and opulence of its citizens. So, on the banks of the Mississippi, before the lapse of a decade, would rise another Washington, preeminent over the old in all those accessories which should characterize the seat of a magnificent Republic.

I

SAT a long time on the cliffs that night, looking at the sea. The sun set behind clouds of crimson and gold, the waves rolled in on the beach in broken sheets of flame, the sky paled to an amber hue, and the gray twilight slowly appeared; but still I lingered.

On the morrow I should be far away. Then I should be no more Muriel Browning, but Muriel Weir - Paul Weir's wife. There were no dark clouds in my thoughts, as I sat there dreaming of the future. There would be no loosing of dear ties, no severing of the links of love and tenderness. I was gaining all, losing nothing. The future lay before me as a summer sea -bright, beautiful, glorious; each ripple tinted in the warm yellow light; each drop of spray sparkling in the sunshine; each wave rolling proudly to its sure and certain haven. Had I forgotten that the twilight had gathered and the night would come?

The moon rose full and clear, shedding its mellow light on the restless rolling sea, and throwing dark shadows from the rugged rocks which surrounded me. I watched her as she glided on her way in the blue sky, dotted with soft fleecy clouds, which, near the horizon, were gathered in a gray hazy line. It

So

was a quiet, peaceful hour. The moon smiled lovingly upon me, as I leaned back in my rocky seat, and, looking at her, thought that only the calm, deep happiness of my own heart surpassed the quiet loveliness of the scene. still! so calm! Only the far-off breaking of the waves on the beach below came to my ear; and the silver moon seemed a goddess of silence, gazing down through space upon a quiet world.

It has been said that the most intense happiness is but a step removed from the deepest misery; reach the boundary, cross the dividing line-and one falls as far as from heaven to hell. I do not say that this is true; that in any earthly feeling or affection there can be hights as high as heaven, or depths as low as hell; but that it is possible to reach the very apex of happiness, and to fall, at one plunge, to the deepest gulf of misery, I do believe.

I think something of this kind of thought passed through my mind that night; a fear lest the happiness I possessed might be too great to last; lest the rose of love in my hand might be grasped too closely, and crush the bee within. It might have been, for a longing grew up in my heart to die then, when I was so happy; to die

then, with Paul, when our sky was so bright, our love so deep; to die before sorrow or change had come-together to cross the dark river, and reach the world of unending happiness beyond.

But a sound came to my ear; not the dashing of the waves below, but a voice- -a voice calling my name. I listened; I heard it then distinctly. "Muriel!" How the tone thrilled through me!

"Here, Paul," I answered.

He came to me. I saw his tall form climbing up the rocks long before he reached me.

"Here so late, little one?" he said, as he stooped to kiss me. "I have been looking everywhere for you; but I might have known you were here on your beloved cliffs. I shall be jealous of them, if you like them so much better than my society."

"Be quiet, please, Paul, and sit down," I said; "I have not done looking at the sea yet."

"Yes, this is your last look at it now, Muriel; to-morrow night you-we

shall be at home."

Those five little words, how much they said to me! I thought them over in the few minutes in which we were silent. "We shall be at home." We, Paul and I, in our home. My first real home; I should never have but two. This was to be my first; where would my second be? How happily I could have died at that moment; there, in Paul's arms, with my hand in his! But whether living or dying, it must be together; nothing should separate us. My fingers tightened over his in a convulsive clasp. He started and looked at me in surprise.

"Paul," I said, drawing closer to him, "I wish I could die now, when I am so happy!"

"Die, Muriel? and because you are happy? You must not talk so, darling. What could I do without you?"

Then, looking up into the dark eyes

bent upon me, and reading there all his love and tenderness, I could not wish to leave him, scarcely wish to dieunless

We went home then. I had been there too long, Paul said, as he smoothed my damp hair, on which the dew lay thick. We were a long time crossing the cliffs and the meadow beyond. Perhaps we lingered to enjoy the beauty of the moonlight, or to think sweet thoughts of the bright future which stretched before us, marred by no deserts, overshadowed by no clouds. We parted at the gate of my home. Paul would not go in, but left me there with my hand still warm from his fond clasp, and his whispered words, "It is the last time, darling!" still ringing in my ear.

"The last"-those little words oftentimes so fraught with bitterness! "The last" word of the dying; "the last" kiss, remembered long after the dear lips are cold in death; "the last" meeting; "the last" parting;-how they bring to us memories of "the days that are no more;" of all that is most precious, blessed, never-to-be-forgotten; of what has been and may not be again! But that night they brought only joy to my heart; there seemed no undertone of sadness; only,.like the sweet discord of the seventh, they indicated an un finished, imperfected joy, which would be fully reached, surely as the resolu tion, on the morrow. So I stood at the gate, and watched Paul until he was out of sight. Then I entered the house.

How well I remember it as it looked that night! The square, stiff building, standing out boldly in the moonlight, was flanked by tall trees, while behind it rose a range of hills. A straight gravel walk led to the front door, bordered with prim flower-beds, edged with box. There was a garden-seat at the right, and one at the left in the same angle. A damask rose under the drawing-room window corresponded with a similar