visitor. This magnificent volume is the gift to the Fair of Mrs. Thomas P. James, who collected the materials for it and prepared the work most skilfully. It contains portraits of Washington; an autograph letter written by the same distinguished man; a lock of his hair; original manuscript pages from Mar shall’s and Sparks’ lives of Washington, and a number of fine water-color pictures taken by a compefent artist during the McClellan campaign on the Potomac. This beautiful and historically invaluable book is to be given to the lion. Edward Everett. At this stand we also have two curiosities which should gladden the eyes of a local anti quarian. One is the portrait of the Rev. Mr. Duchd, who delivered the famous first prayer in the first Continental Congress, when that august body met in Carpenter’s Hall, Phila delphia, in 1774. There, also, is a page of the manuscript copy of the same prayer in the handwriting of John Hancock. The tired visitor can rest upon a Washing ton sofa or a Washington chair while looking around at the various relics of the great man which are displayed all about him. (.And, by the way, upon one of these very Washing ton chairs President Lincoln rested when he visited the Fair on .Tune 10, 1864.) Here is the Washington Department proper, just inside the door, and upon the west side of the room. Mrs. John Fallon usually presides at this spot, and the duty is a labor of love to which she bends all her energies. A glass show-case is the sanctum sanctorum, which con tains the most precious of the Washington relics. There are locks of Washington’s hair, presented by Miss Nancy Brigham Peters and Miss Furey; busts, portraits, &c., of Wash ington, and among the portraits an original pencil-sketch of the great man, made by Charles Wilson Peale; dishes used by Wash ington, a china cup and saucer of quaint de vice and pattern, that were used at the wed ding of George Washington and the widow, Martha Custis; a leaden spoon marked “G. W.” which was found at Mt. Vernon ; Wash ington’s butter-dish; a pair of salt-cellars given by Washington as a wedding present to Mrs. Frey in 1788, a lady who is now a loyal resident of Philadelphia, Missouri, and given by her to the Fair; pieces of the Washington elm, at Cambridge; a file of the K. J. Gazette for 1799, containing a notice of the death of Washington, and having its pages draped in mourning for him; in short, more Washing ton relics than were ever gathered together north of the Potomac. And then, too, there is a quilt which was presented to the Fair by the Mrs. Frey named above. 'This quilt has a history. According to the statement of the donor, when the revo lutionary war began in earnest, the gentle men raised troops and the ladies collected at Mrs. Washington’s house to sew for them. Oitb ID.a.iljY :e. Her (Mrs. Frey’s) great-grandmother spent the year at Mrs. Washington’s, as did many other ladies whose husbands had gone to fight for their country. In leisure hours they pieced quilts as keepsakes. At this time cot ton was not made into calico. The linen scraps in the quilt were left from the shirts of Capt. George Washington, and the chintz from his mother’s and wife’s dresses. The outside nar row stripe was some of the first imported to America. The spread is lined with what was called muslin, which was also imported. There are some other odd matters in this case which do not properly come under the head of Washington relics. There is a very curious watch, which was presented by Lafay ette to General Anthony Wayne, and another equally curious time-piece that was used in the last illness of the poet Cowper. A quaintly carved powder-horn of the time of Cromwell attracts the attention of the curious. In the way of clocks we have one exhibited which belongs to Mr. John A. McAllister, and which that gentleman claims to have been the first, or among the first ever brought to the United States. There is another ancient time-piece which belongs to Mr. B. J. Lee dom, of Germantown, which Mr. L. says came over in the ship Welcome, with William Penn, in 1082. The chair, or rather a combination of chair and table, upon which Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence, is exhibited hard by the relics which we have just described. In its immediate vicinity is the President’s chair of the American Philosophical Society, a chair that was used by Benjamin Franklin, and by every President of the Society since his time. Marie Antoinette’s chair, which is among this chair collection, will commend itself to the notice of all who take an interest in the sad story of the hapless Queen who followed her husband to the guillotine, after having been for years the royal mistress of the Tuilleries. The chair is covered with the same old Gobelin tapestry which adorned it before the kingly residence it graced was given over to sack and pillage. Franklin’s chess table is appropriately placed near by the relics of his revolutionary associates, and of the unfortunate lady who graced the court where he was an honored guest. On this table Franklin and Washington were accustomed to play chess together. If we were preparing a catalogue of the Department of Curiosities and Relics, and had abundant room for description, we would revel among the curious things spread around us ; but want of space admonishes us to be brief. We go on in the line of march we have taken up on the west side of the apart ment, and notice in their regular order a piece of Shakspeare’s mulberry tree; an autograph quilt, bearing the sign manual of scores of illustrious personages, from President Lincoln down; sets of rare old china that would be valuable and curious to any appreciative per son, but estimated to be worth almost their weight in gold to their owners; heathen idols, and relics of almost all kinds from Holy Land ; a drinking cup of virgin silver, most curiously wrought, and lined with gold, and (what is best) a gift to the Fair; Mrs. Franklin’s wed ding dress; a dress worked with peacock’s feathers, worn by Miss Ramsey, a revolution ary beauty ; curious paintings and valuable engravings; the Constitution of the Society of the Cincinnati, signed by all the principal officers of the Revolution, from Washington down; a copy of Marshall’s “Life of Wash ington,” containing the autograph of its former owner, Robert Southey, and bound in an old dress of the poet’s wife. At the upper end of the old curiosity shop there is an unique collection of brackets and other ornaments, most ingeniously made from the roots of the American laurel. There is also a very curious shell-work monument erected to the memory of General Baker, who fell at Pall’s Bluff. Returning upon the east side of the room there is much to interest the lover of the curi ous. There is the original warrant for the ar rest of Aaron Burr for treason; a similar docu ment authorizing the taking of Benedict Arnold into custody, on the charge of being drunk and disorderly, (an offense more serious in the sight of some than his great crime at West Point, now that treason has become so common an offense;) an original miniature of Sir Harry Vane, Speaker of the Long Parlia ment, taken in 1G47 ; a piece of the court-dress of Marie Antoinette; a curious clock and vase which formerly belonged to the Empress Jose phine, and whioli is now the property of Miss Fisher ; an exquisite bas relief, in yellow mar ble, representing Guido’s Aurora, formerly the property of Cardinal Antonelli, and given to the Fair by his Eminence, with his photo graph and autograph. In the centre of the apartment is a range of vases, the contents of which would gladden the heart and delight the eyes of Mr. Jona than Oldbuck. There are books printed by Caxton and his German cotemporaries; those marvellous old, illuminated missals, upon parchment, that were made before Faust or Schoeffer were dreamed of; and curious liter aure of almost all ages. We find also, in the same range, a number of Jefferson relics and other curious matters that demand an amount of space in the way of deserved notice quite equal to all the room which we can bestow upon the whole depart ment. We are almost ashamed to take up the priced catalogue of autographs in this department, and to feel a conviction of the utter hopeless ness of our being able to go into any circum stantial notice of its rich contents. We can
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