DC By the Book

Excerpt: It was raining at noon, when we finally arrived in Washington. A cold drizzle fell from heavily swagged clouds that seemed to lower on the unfinished Capitol like the lid of an upholstered box. I asked that we go directly to the hospital, for if the news was the worst I wished to hear it soonest. Mr. Brooke had obtained directions to the place, which had been a hotel before the multiple disasters at Manassas and on the Peninsula. The wreckage of our army has claimed the city's colleges and churches; even, so they say, the space between the curiosity cabinets of the Patent Office. It was fortunate that Mr. Brooke had thought to inquire in particular detail, for the first hackman was an overbearing rogue who insisted that he went our way, and I should have believed him, had not Mr. Brooke intelligently interrogated the man and learned that his destination was the other side of the city altogether. When Mr. Brooke chided him for an attempted swindle, the hackman swore, and said how should he be expected to know, since every day a hospital seemed to spring up in some new place, and his confusion was honestly come by.