are told, carelessly, "those are only the interior boulevards....
Nothing! You should see our exterior boulevards--not quite finished
yet!"




III

THE CAPITOL AND OTHER SITES


"Here, Jimmy!" said, briskly, a middle-aged administrative person in
easy attire, who apparently had dominion over the whole floor beneath
the dome. A younger man, also in easy attire, answered the call with an
alert smile. The elder pointed sideways with his head at my two friends
and myself, and commanded, "Run them through in thirty minutes!" Then,
having reached the center of a cuspidor with all the precision of a
character in a Californian novel, he added benevolently to Jimmy, "Make
it a dollar for them." And Jimmy, consenting, led us away.

In this episode Europe was having her revenge on the United States, and
I had planned it. How often, in half a hundred cities of Europe, had I
not observed the American citizen seeing the sights thereof at high
speed? Yes, even in front of the Michael Angelo sculptures in the Medici
Chapel at Florence had I seen him, watch in hand, and heard him murmur
"Bully!" to the sculptures and the time of the train to his wife in one
breath! Now it was impossible for me to see Washington under the normal
conditions of a session. And so I took advantage of the visit to
Washington of two friends on business to see Washington hastily, as an