those wealthy shipping
merchants who were responsible for Georgetown's early prosperity.

Mrs. Harriot Beall Williams left this property, all the way down to
Back (Q) Street, to her daughter Harriot Eliza Harry. Through her it
passed to Harriot Beall Chesley, and then to her daughter, Emily
McIlvain Darneille. The old house stood untenanted for several years
until bought for the erection of the apartments.

Mr. and Mrs. Darneille had three daughters, the eldest really a beauty
(the youngest inherited the old name of Harriot), and they had a great
deal of gaiety there in the nineties. I remember especially the New
Year's Day receptions they used to have, the many "hacks" overflowing
with young men, that used to climb the hill. It was the custom in those
days for the ladies of each household to receive on the afternoon of
that day. Only gentleman callers came, all dressed in their very best,
and left their cards for all the ladies of their acquaintance. If you
weren't receiving (attired in your best, sometimes to the extent of real
low-necked evening dresses, the dining room table loaded with salads,
old hams, biscuits, ices, candies, tea and coffee--and always a punch
bowl on the side) you hung a basket on your front door bell, and the
callers just deposited their cards and went on to the next place.

What fun the children had, watching the front doors and counting the
cards; and there was a real thrill when the caller happened to be an
Army or Navy officer, attired in full-dress uniform with gold braid and
feathers, having earlier in the day paid his respects at the White
House.

On part of the Darneille property stands an intriguing frame house. It
is quite an old house and stood originally several hundred feet to the
eastward in Mackall Square, the property owned by Christiana Beall
Mackall, who was the sister of Harriot Beall Williams. So you see one
sister sold it to the other and it took a trip across Washington (30th)
Street to reside on Congress (31st) Street. I wonder how they moved it
in those days, for it was a long, long time ago.

Mr. and Mrs. Charles Dodge lived there after they left Evermay.

In the 1880's this house, 1633 31st Street, was the home of a very
interesting and eminent person, John Wesley Powell, American geologist
and ethnologist. I now quote from the _Encyclopaedia Britannica_: "He was
born at Mount Morris, N. Y., March 24, 1834. His parents were of English
birth, but had moved to Ame