Washington, its sights and insights [1903] — John Shaqi
Washington, its sights and insights [1903]Monroe, Harriet Earhart
History
Washington, its sights and insights [1903]
Monroe, Harriet Earhart
Washington (D.C.) -- Description and travel
The room has special acoustic qualities which in early days occasioned
much trouble. A whisper scarcely audible to the ear into which it is
breathed is distinctly heard in another part of the hall. It is one of
the most remarkable whispering galleries in the world, and its peculiar
properties, accidentally discovered, produced no end of disturbances
before they were fully understood. Their effect has been much modified
by a recent change in the ceiling.
Each State is now permitted to place in Statuary Hall two statues of its
most renowned sons.
Virginia has Washington and Jefferson. Think of that! New Hampshire has
Daniel Webster, who made these walls echo with his thrilling, patriotic
sentences, and John Stark, of Bunker Hill fame, who cried: “See those
men? They are the redcoats! Before night they are ours, or Molly Stark
will be a widow!”
Pennsylvania has Robert Fulton, the inventor, and John Peter Gabriel
Muhlenberg, the preacher, Major-General in the Revolution. He was also
Senator and Member of Congress. New York has Robert R. Livingston, of
the Continental Congress, and Alexander Hamilton. The latter was
Washington’s Secretary of the Treasury during both of his Presidential
terms. He had much to do with securing a good financial system for the
new government. His pathetic death enhanced his fame and ruined Burr;
but under the search-light of history one can not help wondering had
Burr been killed and Hamilton survived that duel, would the halo of the
latter have faded? The statue of Hamilton is one of the best in the
Hall. It was made in Rome by Horatio Stone.
The Illinois memorial is the famous Vinnie Ream statue of Lincoln. I
wish, because it was done by a woman, that I could like it, but it is
weak and unworthy. In every line of his strong, patriotic face lived the
gospel of everlasting hope. This figure might well stand for one
vanquished in the race. (Was Jesus vanquished? Was Paul? Was Luther? Was
Lincoln?)
There is a small bust of Lincoln, by Mrs. Ames, which approaches nearer
the true ideal of the great apostle of Liberty.
Illinois is further represented by James Shields, Senator. It would seem
that men like Washington and Lincoln, who were the product of national
influences, should be venerated as representatives of the nation rather
than of individual States.
Missouri is represented by Frank Blair and Thomas H. Benton; Vermont, by
Jacob Collamer and Ethan Allen, the hero of Ticonderoga; Oregon, by
Edward Dickinson Baker, whose fine statue is by Horatio Stone.
Jacques Marquette (by G. Trentanore), in the garb of a Catholic priest,
represents Wisconsin. Ohio has President Garfield and William Allen.
Roger Sherman and John Trumbull represent Connecticut, and Rhode Island
memorializes Roger Williams and General Nathanael Greene, of
Revolutionary fame—the former, in his quaint sixteenth century garb,
standing as well for religious freedom as for the State which he
founded.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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