ivers; such a
bewildering array of broad streets, wide avenues, and roomy public
parks, as would be ample and suitable for a brilliant city like Paris,
(whose system of streets he had taken as a model,) at least sufficient
for the wants of a population of a half million. The dawn of the
twentieth century saw a complete realization of General Washington's
brightest hopes, a verification of his prophetic visions. The wand of
progress had transformed the straggling village of "magnificent
distances," into the most royally beautiful city on the continent. A
city which had become the pride and delight of one hundred millions of
free people, who individually felt a personal interest in the vastness,
the beauty and the imposing grandeur of its magnificent public
buildings, which represented the crowning loveliness of architectural
design, the highest artistic expression of American genius; altogether
most perfectly and fittingly adorning the unrivaled capitol city of the
most progressive, powerful, and meritoriously dominant republic on the
face of the planet! To this Mecca of republics, as the social and
political center of the western hemisphere, came the great thinkers,
scientists, artists, orators and statesmen of the world.

Commandingly situated on Columbia Heights, overlooking this surpassingly
beautiful city, was Fenwick Hall, the home of Fern Fenwick. The Hall was
a large quadrangular structure of imposing appearance, erected in the
center of spacious grounds, most charmingly laid out, with a rare
combination of lawn, flowers and shrubbery. The material used in its
construction was Seneca sandstone, in color a rich dark red, and was
trimmed with a pale mottled green stone, quite as beautiful as
serpentine. The effect of the combination was as harmonious as it was
ornamental. The main building was four full stories in height above the
deep basement. It was made more conspicuous and more picturesque by the
four octagonal towers, one-half of which projected from each corner of
the building. These beautiful towers of a uniform size, rose thirty
feet above the roof of the building itself. The basement and towers were
of rough green stone; the caps and sills of the long, deep windows,
together with the arcade, were of green stone, beautifully carved and
polished. The arcade, which served both as a covered way, and a portico
over the main entrance, was at once artistic and unique. It was formed
by a picturesque combination o