1858. 



NEW ENGLAKD FARMER. 



163 



For the New England Farmer. 

 LETTER PEOM MAJOB FRENCH. 



Wasliingion City, Jan. 30, 1858. 



My Dear TJrowx ; — I suppose you would like to 

 hear from Washington, and be told how matters 

 and tilings are progressing in this Federal me- 

 tro]iolis, now the light of your countenance is 

 withdrawn from us. We enjoyed your visit ex- 

 ceedingly, and the .shadow of your departure cast 

 its gloom over one breakfast at least ! I see by 

 your weekly that you posted your readers up 

 pretty well in regard to the agricultural doings at 

 the annual meeting of the U. S. Agricultural So- 

 ciety. You have not, however, said anything of 

 our' new President, more than to mention his 

 name, and that he was elected. That hiatus in 

 your account I will endeavor briefly to supply. 



Gen. Tench Tilghman is a farmer and a gen- 

 tleman — most farmers are — and it does not re- 

 quire much knowledge of physiognomy to judge 

 at a glance by his appearance, of the character of 

 the man. Good nature, gentleness, firmness of 

 purpose and high intelligence are as plainly writ- 

 ten on his countenance, as this writing of mine 

 is upon this white paper ; and the compositors 

 always give me great credit for plain Avriting ! 

 His age is, perhaps, fifty, if anything on the sun- 

 nv side of that climactric. He is of medium 

 height, of fine figure, and has much of the milita- 

 ry air which was drilled into him at West Point, 

 where he received his education. He was ap- 

 pointed a Lieutenant of Artillery in 1832, and 

 resigned in the following year. He was U. S. 

 Consul at Turk's Island in 1849, and has been 

 honored by his own State with several offices. 

 He is the grandson of Col. Tilghman, of the rev- 

 olutionary army, one of Gen. Washington's aids- 

 de-camp, and is a distinguished member of the 

 Cincinnati. He is a gentleman of wealth, and 

 cultivates his large ancestral plantation on the 

 eastern shore of Maryland, near Oxford. He is, 

 in every respect, worthy to succeed our late able, 

 popular and accomplished President, Hon. Mar- 

 shall P. Wilder, to whose indomitable energy 

 and j^erseverence the U. S. Agricultural Society 

 owes a debt of gratitude which it can never repay. 



It is generally known, I believe, that but for 

 Col. Wilder's preremptory declination, he would 

 have again been elected to the office he so admi- 

 ral)ly filled. 



The United States Agricultural Society has 

 started into the present year under glorious aus- 

 pices. With an energetic and accomplished Pres- 

 ident, supported as he is by a Vice President of 

 character and influence from every State and Ter- 

 ritory, with an Executive Committee which has 

 already evinced a determination to do all in their 

 power to sustain the society, and with that untir- 

 ing worker, Maj. Ben : Perley Poore as the 

 Secretary, with a permanent office established in 

 iJiis city, from which is to be issued a monthly 

 bulletin, what may not the farming commimity 

 hope, expect, indeed, from it ? Its days of Iwpe 

 are passed, and those of fruition have commenced. 



The office of the society, occupied by the Sec- 

 retary and Treasurer, is in Todd's marble build- 

 ing, adjoining Brown's hotel, on Pennsylvania 

 Avenue ; and it is due Mr. Todd, who is from 

 Massachusetts, to say that after placing the rent 

 at a very low rate, he generously deducted fifty 

 dollars as his own contributioru 



The society only wants now the hearty co-opera- 

 tion of the farmers of the United States to make 

 it the very corner-stone of the agricultural in- 

 terests of the country. 



AVhen here you made a pretty thorough in- 

 spection, I believe, of the improvements now in 

 process at the capitol, and expressed your own 

 admiration of the new hall of the House of Rep- 

 resentatives. There is no doubt that so far as 

 hearing is concerned, it is a better room than the 

 old hail. In size it is by far more commodious, 

 and in gilding and red morocco it blazes out like 

 a bright coal fire compared with an air-tight 

 stove. In architectural beauty it compares with 

 the noble columns, beautiful ceiling and fine pro- 

 portions of the old hall about as the Egyptian 

 figures we have seen in stone, (always supposing 

 a little gold leaf added to brighten them uj),) with 

 the Venus de Medicis or Apollo Belvidere ! It 

 is a great square iron room, gilded. It is enclos- 

 ed entirely by a suite of surrounding rooms, so 

 that not one particle of God's free air can pene- 

 trate it, and it is to be ventilated by an artificial 

 contrivance, like the blower of a steamboat, which 

 is to blow in the air for our conscript fathers to 

 breathe, as soon as the weather becomes so warm 

 as not to need fires in the furnaces. At the pres- 

 ent time the air from the furnaces, or rather pass- 

 ing through them, is the article furnished for 

 lung consumption, and through the aid of which 

 the legislative Avisdom of the nation makes itself 

 heard. It may work first-rate, and the members 

 may be delighted Avith their cellar-like hall, but I 

 am one of those Avho doubt. Time will show. 



The work is going on all over the building, 

 notwithstanding it is mid-winter. The weather 

 thus far has been such as not to interfere in any 

 way with out-of-door labor, and some of our days 

 recently have had all the mildness and beauty of 

 October weather. 



The new dome is the main outside feature of 

 observation. It has not gained in height any 

 since you saw it, but the enlargement of the base, 

 by the addition all around it of a cast iron Cc sing, 

 is now going on, and as soon as that is complet- 

 ed it will begin to show its magnificence, for it 

 will be a magnificent affair. The only fear is that 

 it will be so large as to overshadow the building 

 — that instead of being a capitol surmounted 

 with a dome, it will be a dome with a capitol for 

 its foundation ! 



The Treasury and Post Office extensions are 

 rapidly progressing. The city Post Office has re- 

 cently been moved into the latter, and is so ar- 

 ranged as to be as complete and convenient as it 

 is possible for a Post Office to be. It is highly 

 creditable to all who have had the control of 

 building and arranging it. It is pleasant to see 

 these things going on here, for although silent, 

 they outweigh many fold all the clamor and rhodo- 

 mantade noAv so rife against the perpetuity of the 

 Union. They illustrate perfectly the old adage, 

 "actions speak louder than words." 



The political horizon, so far as regards Kansas, 

 is yet cloudy. There are some bright spors, now- 

 ever, which give promise of a general clearing up 

 ere long. I was gratified to see in this morning's 

 National Intelligencer a candid and impartial 

 statement from Gov. Stanton, who has just re- 

 turned from the Territory, placing things in their 

 true light, for which he is entitled to the thanks 



