A few features of Washington as it appeared during the civil war are indelibly fixed in my memory. An endless train of army wagons ploughed its streets with their heavy wheels. Almost the entire southwestern region, between the War Department and the Potomac, extending west on the river to the neighborhood of the observatory, was occupied by the Quartermaster's and Subsistence Departments for storehouses. Among these the astronomers had to walk by day and night, in going to and from their work. After a rain, especially during winter and spring, some of the streets were much like shallow canals. Under the attrition of the iron-bound wheels the water and clay were ground into mud, which was at first almost liquid. It grew thicker as it dried up, until perhaps another rainstorm reduced it once more to a liquid condition. In trying first one street and then another to see which offered the fewest obstacles to his passage, the wayfarer was reminded of the assurance given by a bright boy to a traveler who wanted to know the best road to a certain place: “Whichever road you take, before you get halfway there you 'll wish you had taken t' other.” By night swarms of rats, of a size proportional to their ample food supply, disputed the right of way with the pedestrian.