CHAPTER XLVI.

Philip left the capitol and walked up Pennsylvania Avenue in company with

Senator Dilworthy. It was a bright spring morning, the air was soft and

inspiring; in the deepening wayside green, the pink flush of the

blossoming peach trees, the soft suffusion on the heights of Arlington,

and the breath of the warm south wind was apparent, the annual miracle of

the resurrection of the earth.

The Senator took off his hat and seemed to open his soul to the sweet

influences of the morning. After the heat and noise of the chamber,

under its dull gas-illuminated glass canopy, and the all night struggle

of passion and feverish excitement there, the open, tranquil world seemed

like Heaven. The Senator was not in an exultant mood, but rather in a

condition of holy joy, befitting a Christian statesman whose benevolent

plans Providence has made its own and stamped with approval. The great

battle had been fought, but the measure had still to encounter the

scrutiny of the Senate, and Providence sometimes acts differently in the

two Houses. Still the Senator was tranquil, for he knew that there is an

esprit de corps in the Senate which does not exist in the House, the

effect of which is to make the members complaisant towards the projects

of each other, and to extend a mutual aid which in a more vulgar body

would be called "log-rolling."

It is, under Providence, a good night's work, Mr. Sterling. The

government has founded an institution which will remove half the

The Gilded Age