THE STORY OF AN ENTOMOLOGIST 



the topographic division of the Post Office Department. He was 

 the only person I knew in Washington, and I had written to 

 him, asking him to engage a boarding house for me, and he had 

 answered that I could room with him over Kennedy's grocery 

 store at 1209 F Street. I reached Washington about dinner-time, 

 and went at once to Borden's boarding house at the northwest 

 corner of F and 13th Streets. I found Mac and his mother and 

 his stepfather at dinner, and after dinner we went to our lodg- 

 ings. The stepfather. Colonel Carter, and Mrs. Carter, Mac's 

 mother, had rooms directly below us. 



The Carters were most interesting people. The Colonel was a 

 politician, and I think that his wife, who was very handsome, 

 was something of a lobbyist. The Colonel, although a Virginian, 

 was a Republican, and was called a "Carpet-bagger" by the 

 Democrats, since he had gone to Louisiana after the War, and 

 had become Speaker of the State Legislature. He held that post 

 at the time of the Warmoth riots, in the course of which the 

 Lieutenant-Governor, a negro, was killed. The Colonel was very 

 hard of hearing, and once told me that that disability had been 

 of great service to him in presiding over the Legislature, since 

 he could recognize anyone he pleased and lay his inability to 

 recognize the first man who arose to his deafness. He was a good 

 stump speaker, and was used by the Republican Party as a 

 campaign orator. After the election of President Garfield, he was 

 rewarded by an appointment as Minister to Venezuela. After 

 Garfield died, however, in the summer of 1881, he had to resign, 

 and was succeeded by some other man appointed by President 

 Arthur. 



The Colonel, I am afraid, was something of a poseur, and had 

 greatly impressed his wife and his stepson with his importance. 

 I came into the room one evening and found him playing euchre 

 with Mac, and with one of Nick Carter's (no relation) dime 



[27] 



