and slept on the ground, lighted up by the fiery red glare from the burning buildings in Washington. All night they lay alarmed and distressed, while but few could steal a moment’s repose. The bursting shells in the navy yard were heard for miles, and each boom was a knell to the agonizing hearts, who knew not where their helpless ones were in this hour of horrors. When the British marched slowly into the wilderness city, by the lurid light that shot up from the blazing capitol, the population had dwindled down to a few stragglers and the slaves of the absent residents. The houses, scattered over a large space, were shut, and no sign of life was visible. The President had crossed the Potomac early in the afternoon, and Mrs. Madison had followed in another direction. The bayonets of the British guard gleamed as they filed down the avenue, and the fulminations from the navy yard saluted them as they passed. Nothing but the prayers and entreaties of the ladies, and the expostulations of the nearest residents, deterred the British General Ross from blowing up the Capitol; but he ordered it to be fired at every point, and many houses near it were consumed. A house hard by, owned by General Washington, was destroyed, which, in justice to human nature be it said, the General regretted. Not so the Admiral, who ordered the troops to fire a volley in the windows of the Capitol, and then entered to plunder. I have, indeed, to this hour (said Mr. Richard Rush, in 1855), the vivid impression upon my eye of columns of flame and smoke ascending throughout the night of the 24th of August from the Capitol, President’s house, and other public edifices, as the whole were on fire, some burning slowly, others with bursts of flame and sparks mounting high up in the dark horizon. This never can be forgotten by me, as I accompanied out of the city, on that memorable night, in 1814, President Madison, Mr. Jones, then Secretary of the Navy, General Mason, of Anacostia Island, Mr. Charles Carroll, of Bellevue, and Mr. Tench Ringgold. If at intervals the dismal sight was lost to our view, we got it again from some hill-top or eminence where we paused to look at it.”