settlers of her father's design of cutting them off. She was subsequently married to Mr. Rolfe, an English gentleman, with whom she visited his native country. The fourth piece of sculpture is by R. Gevelot, representing the treaty between Penn and the Indians in 1682. On each side of those over the grand entrances are the sculptured heads of Raleigh, Columbus, Cabot, and La Sale. The House of Representatives, connected with the Rotunda by a passage, is of a semicircular form; its greatest length being 95 feet, with a painted roof and dome 60 feet in height, supported by about 24 columns of highly-polished Potomac marble, or pudding-stone, with capitals of white Italian marble, which, I thought, made a contrast very unpleasing to the eye, reminding one (as a gentleman near me remarked) of a negro with a white turban upon his head. A very large and handsome chandelier is suspended from the centre of the dome, in which there is also a skylight, and small lamps are attached to each column; so that the House is most brilliantly illuminated at night, when the debates continue beyond day-light, which is seldom the case. The speaker's chair is in the centre of the base of the semicircle, and elevated under a canopy of drapery nine steps above the floor of the house; with clerks' desks immediately under, and the newspaper reporters in a low gallery on each side, and in rear of the speaker. The members sit fronting the speaker in amphitheatrical rows, and each is furnished with a chair, desk, writing materials, and last, though not least, a brass spittoon. In rear of them, and between the marble columns, are those persons who, though not members, are yet entitled to a seat upon the floor of the house. The strangers' gallery, of marble, with three rows of cushioned seats and a carpeted floor, is raised about 12 or 14

feet above the body of the house, and occupies the space between the columns and the wall, the full extent of the semicircle. Over the speaker's chair is a large statue of Liberty, and another (what it was intended to represent I was at a loss to discover for several days) is opposite to it over the entrance door. A full-length portrait of Lafayette, with the American standard and a copy of the Declaration of Independence, decorates one side of the House; and it is intended to place one of Washington on that opposite. About 150 members were present when I entered, and the coup d'œil was remarkably imposing and magnificent. I had not formed the slightest conception that I should have witnessed any thing so grand, and it struck me as exceeding in splendour any thing I had ever seen. The subject before the House was either trifling or very uninteresting, to judge from the whispering and talking of some members, and the incessant rustling of letters, books, and newspapers, kept up by others. It was in vain that I strained my powers of hearing to the uttermost; I could not arrive at the pith of a single speech. The building is evidently ill calculated for sound, a speaker's voice being entirely lost in the vast expanse of dome. An attempt was made to rectify this fault, by hanging drapery between the marble columns, but it has been of very little avail in confining the sound; and the only project which is likely to answer would be by having an artificial roof, or a glass dome, which would not detract much from the appearance, suspended a few feet above the level of the strangers' gallery.

I was sitting in the gallery one day, during a discussion as to whether the house should make a grant for defraying the expense of printing the debates, and, not thinking it particularly interesting, opened my note-book, and