As we reached Washington there was a rift in the clouds overhead, and a brilliant ray of sunlight darted through, lighting up the city, and gilding the great dome of the Capitol with heavenly alchemy; it might have been that some immortal eye had opened suddenly, winked upon this wicked world, and shut again, for in a moment it was as dark and cheerless as before. Here we change cars, and as we pass through the little waiting-room there is a general rush, a clustering at one spot, and a babel of voices clash one with another; we catch a few wandering words--“Here’s where he fell, right here,” “Carried out that way,” “The wretch, I hope he’ll be hung,” &c. We look down and see a small brass star let into the ground, which marks the spot where poor Garfield fell; women prod it with their parasols, men assault it with their walking-sticks. We have no time to shed the “tributary tear”; the bell rings “All aboard, all aboard,” and in another moment we are on our way to Richmond. The weather clears, a few glancing gleams of golden sunlight stream through the broken clouds, then the sun closes its watery eye and goes to sleep, with a fair promise of a bright to-morrow. We roll on through the fresh greenery of Maryland till the evening shadows fall and the death of the day’s life goes out in gloom and heaviness. We spend the hours in anticipatory speculations till we reach Richmond about ten o’clock; we drive at a rapid pace through the rough stony streets till we pull up at Ford’s hotel, where we intend taking up our quarters. A night arrival at a strange hotel is always more or less depressing--on this occasion it is especially so; we pass from the dim obscurity of the streets without to a still greater obscurity within. Preceded by a wisp of a lad we ascend the stairs and pass through a dimly-lighted corridor; not the ghost of a sound follows us, the echo of our footsteps is muffled in the thick carpet, and swallowed up in the brooding silence.