324 THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF 



remarked on by visiting strangers. The smoothness and spa- 

 ciousness of the highways seem to be a perpetual source of de- 

 light, while the want of commercial bustle and rush and turmoil 

 in tbe streets is to many a visitor visible evidence of the laziness 

 and indifference engendered by the public service. Whether 

 this judgment be wise or otherwise, it is not for those judged 

 to determine ; yet we know that though first impressions are 

 prone to last, it is not because of their accuracy ; and from judg- 

 ments we often learn more of the quality of the judge than of 

 that concerning which he pronounces judgment. 



Most of our large cities are given over to manufactures and 

 commerce. The energy of the citizens is given to making things, 

 to transporting them, to buying and to selling. Business activ- 

 ity and prosperity, to the resident of such cities, means crowded 

 and noisy streets, filled with endless streams of men, women, and 

 traffic, horses, trolley cars, cobblestones, policemen, street fakirs, 

 big wagons, little wagons, automobiles, with fake extras of yel- 

 low journals shouted above all the din. To those whose lives 

 are spent in such surroundings, Washington seems dull and 

 stupid. 



Washington is now nearly a century old, it having been first 

 occupied as the seat of government in 1800. It was on June 15 

 of that year that tbe public offices were first opened, and on No- 

 vember 22 following that Congress for the first time met in Wash- 

 ington. 



At the close of the Revolution, when Congress was in session 

 in Philadelphia, it will be remembered some of the unpaid sol- 

 diers grew impatient at the delay in settling their accounts. To 

 hasten a settlement and stimulate what they deemed a dawd- 

 ling and lazily deliberative Congress to prompt action, these 

 soldiers made a threatening demonstration about the old State- 

 house where Congress was then in session. 



Just as the present war with Spain has suddenly and pro- 

 foundly affected the thinking, the outlook, and the points of 

 view of all who think, so this little demonstration to hasten the 

 payment of money due taught Congress, the apt pupil, a lesson 

 which the teacher,a mutinous soldiery, neither knew nor dreamed 

 of. Our forefathers had chafed under the presence and support 

 of an army maintained against the citizens at the cost of the cit- 

 izens and in the interest of the sovereign. When their own cit- 

 izen soldiery grew mutinous, a new view suddenly appeared and 

 with it a new danger. Out of this new view and from this real 



