THE CITY OF WASHINGTON
Toward the northwest and southeast runs Pennsylvania Avenue, one hundred sixty feet wide, the most famous street in the city. About a mile and a half up Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol is another imposing group of public buildings. Here are the Treasury Department, the Executive Mansion,—the home of the president,—and the State, War, and Navy Building. Pennsylvania Avenue leads past the fronts of these buildings and on for more than two miles to the far-western part of the city.
A VIEW OF PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE
Directly west from the Capitol we look along the fine parkways which divide the city in that direction just as do the main streets which run from the Capitol to the north, east, and south. This handsome series of parks is called the Mall. In the Mall are a number of public buildings placed in an irregular line stretching west from the Capitol, with sufficient distance between them to allow spacious grounds for each building. Here we find the home of the Bureau of Fisheries, the Army Medical Museum, the National Museum, the Smithsonian Institution, the Department of Agriculture, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing, and the Washington Monument.
As we walk around the gallery of the Capitol dome, we see that almost every street and avenue is lined on either side with beautiful shade trees which give the city a gardenlike appearance. And looking toward the south we see the eastern branch of the Potomac meeting the main stream and flowing away in a majestic river, over a mile in width. On all sides of the city the land rises in beautiful green hills, guarding the nation's capital as it lies nestled between the river's protecting arms.
Having this picture of the general plan of Washington, let us visit some of the buildings; first of all the Capitol, for it is the most imposing as well as the most important building in the city. For a good view of the building, walk out upon the spacious esplanade which extends across the eastern front. Even here it is hard to appreciate that the Capitol is over 751 feet long, 350 feet wide, and covers more than 3½ acres of ground. The eastern front shows the building to have three divisions, a central building and a northern and a southern wing. Each division has a splendid portico with stately Corinthian columns and a broad flight of steps leading to the portico from the eastern esplanade.
THE UNITED STATES CAPITOL