rather calculate he was; about the first that ever did live or ever
will live. Why, he whipped your Napoleon everlasting whenever he
met him. He whipped everybody out of the field. There warn't
anybody ever lived was able to stand nigh him, and there won't come
any like him again. Sir, I guess our Wellington never had his likes
on your side of the water. Such men can't grow in a down-trodden
country of slaves and paupers." Under such circumstances the
Frenchman would probably be shut up. And when I strove to speak of
Washington I generally found myself shut up also.

Arlington Heights, when I was at Washington, was the headquarters of
General McDowell, the general to whom is attributed--I believe most
wrongfully--the loss of the battle of Bull's Run. The whole place
was then one camp. The fences had disappeared. The gardens were
trodden into mud. The roads had been cut to pieces, and new tracks
made everywhere through the grounds. But the timber still remained.
Some no doubt had fallen, but enough stood for the ample
ornamentation of the place. I saw placards up, prohibiting the
destruction of the trees, and it is to be hoped that they have been
spared. Very little in this way has been spared in the country all
around.

Mount Vernon, Washington's own residence, stands close over the
Potomac, about six miles below Alexandria. It will be understood
that the capital is on the eastern, or Maryland side of the river,
and that Arlington Heights, Alexandria, and Mount Vernon are in
Virginia. The River Potomac divided the two old colonies, or States
as they afterward became; but when Washington was to be built, a
territory, said to be ten miles square, was cut out of the two
States and was called the District of Columbia. The greater portion