e patrons, with cigars and drinkables; chairs and benches
were placed out on the platform overlooking the river. On summer
afternoons, this was a great meeting place for the friends of the two
Dodges.

Many bidders assembled on these advertised dates, hauling commodities
away as purchased, some to the rail depot, some to storage, which kept
the firm officials and stewards busy. One of the faithful employees was
Richard McCraith, a newly arrived Irishman from Cork. He had that noted
propensity of his race for getting orders twisted, but his endeavors to
do right were so earnest and conscientious that his unintentional errors
of judgment were condoned. One urgent order from a patron asked for
delivery to bearer of two sacks of coarse salt. For its hauling the
bearer had a cart. "Here, Richard, go with this man to the warehouse on
High Street and see that his cart is backed up close to the door. The
salt is stored in the third floor. Load it carefully on the hand truck,
wheel it to the window and let it down 'by the fall'--do you get that
straight?" "Yis sir, yis sir!" Presently a man burst into the office,
exclaiming excitedly, "That wild Irishman of yours has raised hell up
the street. He dumped a sack of salt weighing 200 pounds from the third
story to the cart underneath, broke both wheels, and the horse has run
away with the wreck." (Enter Richard!) Said the angry boss, "Now, what
the devil have you done?" Richard: "Yis sir. Didn't you tell me to let
it down 'by the fall'? I did, sir."

In 1867 Francis Dodge, junior, sold this fine house to Henry D. Cooke.
In 1877 he was appointed collector of customs. He was quite an old
gentleman by that time, and the glories of Georgetown's maritime trade
were beginning to be a thing of the past. In fact, with the coming of
the railroads, the huge business of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal was
injured, and from then on the commercial importance of the town began to
dwindle.

Henry D. Cooke, who purchased this house, was the brother of Jay Cooke,
and came to Washington to manage a branch of his brother's large banking
enterprise. He was an intimate friend of General Grant, and I have read
that the general was so fond of his company that he would sit in his
carriage for an hour outside Mr. Cooke's place of business, waiting for
him to go driving.

Claude Bowers, in his most interesting book _The Tragic Era_, speaks of
a brilliant ball given the night before the "breaking of the bu