Chapter II: Part 2

In her face was the sweet look of guileless girlhood, and her dark hair waving back in the breeze coming through the window crowned her sweet face with the tenderest beauty. Her eyes were bright and sparkling with the interest and enthusiasm of young life. They told of a woman's soul that would one day shine out and help to make this bright world more bright and holy.

When the grandmother and Johnny joined them these four stood there with no petty jealousies or bad feeling of any description to mar their happiness as a family. The sinking sun came out from the western clouds and lit up their faces as if they all rested under God's smile of peace.

"Well, Fanny, I am closing my days on earth mighty satisfactory to me. I have been mighty alarmed about what the "Zion's Herald" said about the world's meanness, but I tell you what I have seed wasn't made by mean men. I believe I have felt more of the Lord in my soul in the last few days than I ever did before in so many years. I've seen ribbons, and threshing machines and wheat and corn for a long time but I never had any idea how much brains people had before this. I went to some of the farmer's meetings fer I felt oppressed myself and thought I was just about doing it all myself but when I come here I see I haint nowhere. I used to be afraid that the government was all a going to pieces and that my fighting for the union and that the blood of your Uncle Sam at Gettysburg was of no use but I ain't any more now afraid of the world a bustin' up. People that made the machinery that I've seen and all that have too much sense. My mind is at rest now about all such things. When I seed the big engine I didn't say nothing for I never had any use before to learn words that suited such things, so I just said nothing."

Fanny understood her grandfather's mood, and she smoothed back the hair on his forehead and gently stroked his cheeks with her hands.

"Papers, papers! 'Daily Columbian'!"

A childish voice at the door broke their reverie.

"Grandpa, you must be like city folks and read the papers."

"Here, little boy, is five cents for the morning 'Columbian' and one cent for your evening paper."

"Now, Grandpa, I want you to read. Let's see the headlines."

"_ENTHUSIASTIC THOUSANDS_"

"I was one of that crowd," said Uncle, "but it was too big to be enthusiastic over."

"_Many of the World's Distinguished People Present_"

"That may be right, Fanny, but I don't believe they are very distinguished after they get inside. I know I felt like I had just got extinguished or something."

"_The Colossal Manufacturers' Exhibit Amazes the
Great Crowd of Visitors. The United States
and the Foreign Nations join in Creating
the Greatest Display in the
World's History. Shown like a
Jewel in a Frame of Light_"

"Ah, my little girl, that's my Fanny when she comes between me and the window, a jewel in a frame of light."

Fanny put her hand over his mouth and said, "Grandpa, I don't want you to scold me so unless when I deserve it."

Uncle Jeremiah having read all that interested him, turned the paper over, when his eye fell on the columns of advertisements. He had never read any of them before, and it attracted his interest at once.

"Look hyar, Johnny! Here is a position you might git if you had only done as I have teached and learnt your lesson at school." And Uncle read, slowly:

Wanted.--A BRIGHT, HONEST, IN-
telligent boy: good Christian; A No. 1
writer; quick at figures, not fond of
play; never reads novels or smokes, or sets
a bad example in any way before children.
Address, * * * * *

"Grandpa, that is a sad reminder," said Fanny, as she came up and looked over his shoulder at the paper.

"Why?"

"Because God loves a shining mark, and all those boys are dead. On their tombs should be written: 'Here lies one who lived not wisely, but too well.'"

"Tut! tut! child, how you do talk!"

"Here, father, here is the one. You know I've always wanted a parrot."

Exchange.--WILL EXCHANGE FINE
Parrot, good talker, for a pet monkey.
Address, * * * * * *

"But, Fanny, where's the monkey to exchange?"

"Why, Johnny, of course. I know it would be a trade," she said, rapturously.

Johnny had come up in the meantime, and was leaning on Uncle's right shoulder. At Fanny's words he eyed her suspiciously for a moment, and then, pointing his finger at another advertisement, said: "Father, send Fanny to that place at once. Her first meal will take the people a month to digest, and that will be a big saving, for she won't have to make but one meal a month, and she will never be bothered about doing so much fixing up." The advertisement read:

Cook WANTED.--NEED NOT WASH.
Address, * * * * * *

Uncle crumpled the paper up in his hand and said emphatically, "O you children git out."

But they felt more like talking as they were accustomed to do of evenings at the farm. Johnny had told his adventures and Uncle and Aunt had seen wonderful things which they knew were only interesting to them. What they had seen was to them an awful revelation of what the world was doing in the various lines of work while the farmers were busy with the cares of the farm and isolated from the great industries of life where genius subdues and achieves.

"Somebody brought a heap of wool all the way from New South Wales in Australia, and I felt ashamed of myself when I seed farm products that was brought all the way from the Cape of Good Hope and I hadn't brought nothing from Villaville. We seen farmers from Japan, and China, and Ceylon. I was shocked to see how them Japanese like to have snakes and hobgoblins a crawling round their pavilions but when I seed the Americans jammed all around when there was nicer products in the other places, I just concluded that maybe after all it was our people that liked 'em too, and so made 'em set the fashion here.

"The Canadians tried to beat everything with their twenty-two thousand pound cheese. There is lots of fool extravagance in that place but I guess it was necessary to show what we farmers can do when we make up our minds."

Fanny told about meeting Mr. Blair and how interestingly he explained everything. As she looked up at her Grandma, she saw a troubled look on her face.

"It's nothing," said Grandma, "but I didn't meet young folks that way when I was a girl, and I am afeard now for you; but I've always tried to teach you right, and I know no body can make you believe I haven't teached you just right. I will trust ye. I trusted your mamma when nobody else did, and she didn't do no wrong."

Fanny went over and laid her cheek against her grandma's face and whispered: "Grandma, any body can kill me, but nobody can make me wilfully do wrong."

_CHAPTER V_

COLUMBIA AVENUE

Several unnoteworthy days were spent by Uncle and his family in which they saw through the official buildings of the states and nations; through the Forestry building, showing the forestry wealth of the world; through the leather exhibits, showing the wonders done to the skins of beasts; all over Wooded Island, with its curiosities of Davy Crockett's cabin and the Javanese Hooden; through the clam bakes and the Casino, with the miscellaneous objects of interest about them. Uncle thought he was entering the Liberal Arts building when he walked past the guard at the southeast entrance of the Casino. He wandered into a labyrinth of side-rooms, where he heard an amazing medley of excited voices in as many different languages. They were evidently quarreling over something that displeased them very much. Presently a guard caught him by the arm.

"Are you a musician, sir?"

"Well, I used ter play a Jew's harp a leetle."

"The Casino will open again at three o'clock. You are not allowed in here."

The rest of the family had remained on the outside, suspicious of Uncle's venture. As he returned, led out in rather an undignified way by the guard, Uncle did not relish the amused looks of his family and the casual observers.

"Ah, ha," yelled Johnny in glee, "Grandpa's the first of us to get took by the cop. I'll tell everybody at Villaville about you getting led out."

From here they went on around to the north end of the greatest building on the grounds where were stored the miscellaneous educational achievements of the world.

As they entered the Manufacturers and Liberal Arts building through one of the small entrances on the north, the greatness of that more than forty-four acres of exhibits did not impress itself upon them. The first objects that met their gaze were the graphophones or phonographs. Some nickles were soon in the slots and the family for the first time listening to music coming from some where by singers unseen. Johnny had a face covered with smiles as he listened to some loud-mouthed artist singing "Throw him down McClosky." Between each verse Johnny told the boy who stood in open-mouthed wonder near him that the "feller is a singer from way back." He could not realize that he was not in a concert hall and that all standing about were not hearing what he heard. When the music ceased and he withdrew the tubes from his ears he said to the boy, "Wasn't that out of sight?"

"Sure, and out of my hearing too, but I guess I got a nickle to try it on," and his nickle disappeared in the slot and the unwearied singer hid away in the machine told again his story of the great fight.

When Uncle took the tubes from his ears his eyes were full of tears.

"Why, Grandpa, what's the matter?" asked Fanny who had just listened to some selection by the Marine band.

"Well, you see, I heard something that I used to hear long time ago, and I couldn't tell just who was a singin' it to me. It was some woman, though, and I let myself think it was somebody else, and I was a thankin' God for lettin' me hear her once more. I thought it was Mary singin' "Old Folks at Home" for me, jest like she used to, and I thought for a while that she had come back to me. I wanted to talk to her, and it hurt me when I seed that I couldn't."

There was a stairway near by, and Fanny suggested that they should first go above. They came to the place where they could look out into the main floor. They were near the great clock tower just as the chimes began to peal forth their weird melodies.

"What's that?" cried Aunt, in awe-struck tones.

"It's the chime of the bells," cried Fanny, in delight, "listen! listen!"

Clear and plain through the vast building and to the streets on the outside came the slow measured notes of that nation-thrilling air, "My Country, 'tis of Thee."

All stood entranced before a scene never before reached by human means. When the chimes were done, Uncle said: "Let us go down to the main floor. I want to walk from end to tother of that aisle."

Johnny held in each hand a camp-stool for Uncle and Aunt, and he arranged the stools for them to sit awhile before that wonderful scene. Not long after, they were marching down that aisle called Columbia avenue. They felt themselves every inch as citizens of a great republic. It is not a very long thoroughfare--only a third of a mile--but they were two hours on the way. Uncle was a common, everyday American citizen when he started. At each step it seemed to him he swelled in his own estimation. At the clock tower he was proud enough to ascend that structure and make a Fourth of July speech. At the end of his walk he wanted to wear an eagle on his hat and shout till his throat should be stiff. It was not solely as an American that he was filled with exultation but as a member of the human race. He was lifted up with pride in the achievements of his fellow-man and in satisfaction that his own country was the host of such a splendid company.

Columbia avenue is the broad thoroughfare which traverses the center of the greatest building that ever was. It runs through the Manufactures and Liberal Arts building from the grand court to the plaza at the northern end. A walk down this thoroughfare is like a tour of the world in sixty minutes. Though, if you are to do it in sixty minutes, you must fifty times repress an impulse to linger beside some new marvel in the handiwork of man and go marching on. You cannot beat the record in a trip around the world and stop and see all the grand cathedrals and picturesque ruins and beautiful women and inviting galleries of art.

Columbia avenue is a picture never to be surpassed. It is a cleanly and an attractive thoroughfare for the world of tourists who throng the way. The path is no longer littered with lumber and boxes and kegs of paints. The horizon--for this vast enclosure has its horizon--is no more filled with a fine, white mist rising from the efforts of workmen to push and chisel blocks of staff into their appropriate places. It is a colossal field of process and a panorama of result. The world can not produce a more noble and inspiring place. It is the avenue down which the man on whom fate has fallen and whose steps in this world are few should choose to expend the last remaining atoms of his strength.

Uncle, as an American citizen, came in pride and exultation into the avenue from the central court. He had not been there before. The first thing he did was to stand fully five minutes gazing at the immensity of the enclosure trying to comprehend it, instinctively but vainly seeking adjectives with which to characterize it, and finally giving it all up, as a man gives up trying to measure the ocean or count the stars, conceding it to be too vast and wonderful for the range alike of his vision and his mind. No one told him which way to go, but away over his head, he couldn't guess how many hundred feet, was a line of pendent stars and stripes extending so far in a perspective of red and white that he could not see the fartherest. For aught he knew to the contrary the line led away to the sunny South. But knowing that where the stars and stripes led the way, he could go as he had done in the years of war, he passed on through a maze of wonders greater than even a Solomon could dream.

Not a word had been spoken for some time. Fanny had stopped at a millinery booth.

"Well, now come on Fanny, you wouldn't let me look at them harrows to my heart's content so come on, for you might get ideas into your head that would cost me lots of money and you know these times are expensive enough anyhow."

At the south end of the hall they ascended to the galleries again and soon, came past the educational exhibits that cover every department of human training. There was a booth of educational temperance. Here they read:

|---------------------------|
| _The Star of Hope |
| of the Temperance Reform |
| stands over the |
| School House_ |
|---------------------------|

These letters were on a banner of beautifully wrought silk, and near by was a map of the United States, with seven states distinguished from the rest by being in the darkest black.

"Those states," explained the ladies in charge, "have no school legislation for teaching temperance."

"Yes," soliloquized Uncle, "the school house, the pulpit and the press, are the three forces of freedom and progress in our welfare, but our lives and our natures are not alone molded by these. The fathers and mothers in the home holds greater destinies for the world than all the rest of the forces of the earth together." Then they went through a modeling department. Uncle could not see any use of these things.

"Now, Fanny, I'm tired of these mixing wax and realities together. Here's a man's head four feet across in this glass case. What does it mean?"

"O, that's just an enlarged figure to show the anatomy."

"Well, I didn't come here to see 'natomy, so let's pass on and leave it to other folks that like sich."

Just then some good country people came up and they were almost wild for knowledge as to where the Exposition people dug up that awful giant, and as to how long he lived before the flood, and if it might not be Goilah. Fanny could not stand such an error, and she pointed out to the little girl the card below explaining what the figure intended to show.

They went on past states and foreign countries, and booth after booth of books and papers of the great publishing companies.

"Come here, come this way, all of ye!"

Johnny was wildly motioning to his folks, who had stopped to examine some books in a booth near the north end of the Liberal Arts hall. As they came up to him, he said: "Say, you remember the Century plant, don't you, down in the Horticultural hall, wot's jest bloomed? Well, I've found a Century company, an' I want Fanny to go in thar an' ask the gurl wot hes charge if we kin see it bloomin'."

"They are the people who publish so much about the war and about Lincoln. Let us go in and I'll take some notes about what they have."

Fanny took out her pencil and notebook as they approached the entrance of the booth. All went in together, and the lady in charge, seeing Fanny with a notebook in her hand, came over to her from the opposite side of the room with a rush that almost took the young observer's breath away.

"Are you a reporter, Miss?"

"No, no," said Fanny.

"Oh! Just taking notes for your own amusement."

"Well, not exactly that. I may use them some time."

Fanny had in mind the things she would have to tell to her less fortunate friends at home.

"O I see, going to weave them into a book or a lecture. Just come this way;" and, followed by Johnny, Uncle and Aunt, Fanny went the rounds of the place listening attentively to the interesting talk of the lady in charge as she explained the processes in detail of making a great magazine, the evolution of the English dictionary and of dictionary making in all its phases. She showed them many interesting relics and among them the original letters and documents of the company's great war articles and their life of the martyred president. The lady never had more interested listeners or people more grateful for the trouble she had taken to instruct them.

"No, don't go till you have registered."

Fanny went over and registered for all of them and Uncle went away feeling as if he now had a literary education and could write anything from a war article to a dictionary.

They passed on down and out of the building more impressed than ever concerning the greatness of the world. Aunt rarely said much but now she remarked that she loved their farm and their Jerseys more than ever but she could see that God's mercies and blessings did not rest alone on them and their neighbors. There was indeed a world beyond what she had ever seen or been able to dream.

As they passed on to the gate a family evidently from off the farm passed them.

The eyes of Uncle and the farmer happened to meet and the farmer nodded to him.

"Now look at that," exclaimed Uncle. "How cityfied I'm getting. I didn't nod to that feller. The fust few days I was here I nodded to everybody who looked at me but when they stared back at me like I was an idiot, I quit."

As they came by the Administration building a gentleman passed near them and politely lifted his hat. Without response Aunt and Fanny went on but Uncle grasped the gentleman by the hand and said, "Mr. Moses, I am so glad to see you. I ain't been tuck up yet by the perlice nor lost any money but I guess I would if you hadn't give me such good advice."

"Uncle, I must tell you that my name is Warner, as you have it on my card and not Moses. I told you that name just for a joke because I didn't expect to see you again and you know we don't often tell our names and business to people we meet on the trains."

Uncle was very much troubled. He could not see any joke in a false name being given. He remembered then that Fanny said a young man on the train was shadowing Mr. Moses, and this false name made it look bad for Mr. Warner.

"Well Mr. Warner I am sorry you deceived me for I liked you very much and I aimed to call on you, but maybe I hadn't orter not."

Without another ward Uncle went on to join his waiting family, sadly shaking his head as he thought of the misplaced confidence he had bestowed.

"There," said Mr. Warner, "I have estranged the good opinion of the old man and in his mind made the words of the confidence man seem true. But somehow I feel sure that I shall meet her in a different way."

As he looked after her he said, "There goes the dearest girl on earth to me."

It was arranged that the next day the old people should rest at their hotel all day and at two o'clock Fanny would go to one of the big retail stores to do some needful shopping with Johnny as an escort.

_CHAPTER VI_

DANGERS OF THE GREAT CITY

Johnny was listlessly walking along in front of Dearborn Station, on Polk street, when he saw some fine looking apples on one of the fruit stands. Instantly the old orchard at home came into his mind, and with it a hunger for apples that could not be downed. Fishing up a dime from his pocket, it was not long till two apples were his, one of them undergoing a carving that only a country boy hungry for apples could perform. As he turned the corner he passed a number of bootblacks tossing pennies to the edge of the curbing, the one lodging his penny nearest the edge winning all the other pennies. Johnny watched them long enough to understand their gambling game and then moved on.

"Hi ther, kids," said one, "watch me git a free lunch."

He came quickly up behind the unsuspecting boy and struck one of the apples out of his hand. But before he could pick it up, Johnny gave him a shove that sent him sprawling in the mud. Johnny stooped to regain his apple, but half a dozen of the other boys ran up and began striking him from all sides. His knife was open in his hand, and some one struck him a blow on the hand that knocked the knife into the gutter. Warding off the uncomfortable blows as fast as he could, he ran to get his knife. In an instant he was tripped down upon his face with half a dozen boys cuffing him about the head and shoulders.

"What you skates a-doin' there. Come off now; let a feller have a show!"

The boys were thrust back, and Johnny scrambled to his feet.

"Hello! If it ain't de kid wot's got de purty sister an' helped me to pepper de fake on Stony Island avenoo. Bin a-crapin', have ye, an' them fellers wuz a-doing ye up." It was the train-boy who had been of such service to Johnny's grandfather as they came into the city.

Johnny explained how it all happened, and they went away from the crowd. Johnny's clothes were soiled and his knife and apples were gone, but he was glad to get out of such a rough crowd.

"Where wuz ye goin'?"

"I've got an hour yet, when I am to meet Fanny at the north entrance to the store she's tradin' at. I couldn't stand taggin' after her, so she let me go."

Johnny had wandered from the store into the neighborhood of one of the most disreputable places in the city. He and his friend were coming up the street when the train-boy exclaimed: "Hi, thar, wot's yer sis doin' on dis devilish street wid dat thief yonder?"

Johnny looked where the boy was pointing, and, sure enough, Johnny saw his sister being escorted along the street by Mr. Blair, who had spoken to them of Mr. Moses on the train, and who had been with Fanny one day at the Fair.

"Why, ain't he all right," said John.

"Nary all right. Wusn't he helping to rob your grandad as he was a coming out of the train, and did'nt I nab his pal with the wad of stuff in his hand? He works with the feller what give yer old dad the short change."

Johnny would have started on a run after his sister but Louis said, "Hold on pard, I'm a running this. Ef your sis is all right, that feller is liable to git to travel over the road fer it. I've got it in fer that feller and you see if I don't git him pulled. I tell you if he gits your sis into one of them houses, she'll never come out alive fer she'll kill herself."

Johnny was white with fright but Louis laid his hand on Johnny's shoulder and said: "Now you watch the show."

A policeman was at the next corner and Louis walked up to him with the air of one who had a most important communication to make.

"Me name is Louis Burjois, and dis is de brudder of dat gal wot you see walkin' over dere. She is an innercent gal, which dat feller is a-tollin' of her off. He's a pickpocket, and I'm one wot kin swear to it. We want him arrested an' jugged. We'll see to all de responsibility."

"Ah, you Arabs don't take me in that way. Git out. The gal knows her biz."

By this time Louis saw that the confidence man had stopped at one of the most prepossessing houses on the street. It was also one of the vilest and most dangerous places in the city. The door-bell had been rung, and there was not a moment to lose.

"For God's sake run and yell!" and he gave Johnny a push in their direction, which was all he needed to send him flying up the street yelling and waving his hat and calling "Fanny! Fanny! Fanny!" like a boy gone mad.

The door had opened and Fanny was about to step inside, when she heard her name called. She turned around, but the young man crowded up behind her.

"Who is calling me?" she said. "It must be Johnny. Yes, it's his voice."

"No, it's only a bootblack," her companion said, harshly and excitedly.

"I know its Johnny," and she dodged by him out of the door. He tried to catch her by the arm, but, missing that, seized her dress, nearly tearing it off of her waist. At this moment Johnny dashed up, and, throwing his arms around her, cried: "O Fanny! Fanny! come quick! come away! don't wait a minute!" and he fairly dragged her to the sidewalk.

The young man disappeared through the door but not before he saw Louis come running up and shaking his fist at him yelling at the top of his voice, "O you horrible old cheese, I'll get your mug behind the bars some of these days in spite of yourself."

The policeman was placidly watching the scene, but concluding at last that something unusual was happening he came up and went into the house. A few minutes after he came out alone and walked measuredly on toward the end of his beat.

Fanny in the meantime had pinned her dress and was walking away with the two boys. She was not less excited than they were.

"What is the matter? I can't think. What has happened; there must be something awfully wrong."

"Well, you see, miss, that feller is the pall of the man what tried to rob your grandad and he was a taking of you to one of the worstestes places in Chicago."

"Why he showed me his detective star and also papers and business cards the other day at the Fair. I met him this time in the store. While we were talking there he showed me a blue book which he said was a list of the best society of Chicago, and he showed me his name and his sisters'. I didn't know anything how to trade at the big stores and he said it would please him so much to take me and introduce me to his mother and sisters, who lived only three or four blocks away, and one of his sisters would come back with me and I could do my trading in half the time and to so much better advantage. He talked so nicely that I didn't see how I could refuse to go."

"That's the chap exactly. He's a bad man, and I'm a going to run him in yet."

Louis gave a self satisfied toss of the head, clinched his fists and said, "Its lucky, awful lucky that I seed ye." Fanny shuddered and she whispered a fervent prayer of thankfulness.

They had now arrived at the store and Louis acted as ready escort to the various booths where Fanny desired to trade.

"Don't you forgit that you have to meet me at the Sixtieth street gate at nine o'clock next Monday morning for to be my body guard the whole week and I think I can get our grandpa to throw in about two dollars a day for ye for general services. Anyhow, I don't see how any of us can feel safe any more without you being around. I expect if you come out to our farm, I'd save your life about a dozen times a day for the first week, you'd need me around pretty bad for the first month."

"It's very glad I am that I struck you," said Louis, "for my dad got killed cause he stuck by his engine and I have to help the folks so much that I couldn't get into the Fair only by scheming somehow, and I might not hit the combination."

Fanny and Johnny, still bewildered over their adventures, now took a cable car and in a little while were telling their astonished grandparents about their day's experiences and Fanny's wonderful escape from the confidence man. Uncle could not remember Mr. Blair, but it was a good occasion for one of his impressive lectures on the providence of God.

It was an evening for the electric display at the grounds and at eight o'clock they were seated near the statue of the Republic on the south side of the basin waiting to see the crowning achievement of modern intellect.

No wonder that the papers of the next morning spoke of the "White City in a blaze of glory," and that "thousands viewed the sight, entranced with the marvelous exhibition." It was a sight to inspire the writers of the day, and of all the descriptions that Fanny culled none were more appropriate for recalling the memories of what she saw, and to record what she had experienced, than the reportorial sketches of this night. The hour approached for the most wonderful illumination since God said: "Let there be light."

Slowly night came on, and slowly night was turned back into day. A few stars came out and shone for a little while, and then disappeared from man because of the blaze of light he was in.

To the north and west a heavy pall of smoke brooded over the city. Above it a broad band of gorgeous crimson, shot with purple and yellow, marked the dying glories of the day. Overhead scattered clouds floated against a gray sky, and through them yellow stars were shining. Looking down into the grand basin the white walls of the palaces which bound it loomed gray and ghostly. On the southern horizon the chimneys of a blast furnace belched their red flames high into the darkness.

One by one white globes of light glittered about the graceful sweep of the basin. They cast deep black shadows on the walls behind them, and threw burnished, rippling ribbons over the dark water below. The broad avenue leading to the north between the Mines and Mining and the Electricity buildings grew brilliant on either side. At its far northern end a clump of tangled shrubbery lay in heavy shadow, and still beyond, stretching away for miles, a hundred thousand scattered yellow sparks told that the great city was awake. Far off on the dark lagoon, men were singing, and the echo of their voices rose faintly through the silence.

Suddenly a single beam of yellow light, like a falling star, flickered and grew bright on the high dome of the Administration building. Then lines of fire ran down its splendid sweep, and outlined in flame it stood out in splendor against the night. About its base circled a wheel of light, while above a hundred torches flared into the darkness. Within the great buildings about the basin electric coronas were ablaze and the giant pillars of the colonnades loomed white against the shadows. From their caps huge figures of the arts of peace leaned out over the black abyss beneath. Along the top of the peristyle flickered a yellow ribbon of flame, and above, dim and gray against the sky, senators and heathen gods look down upon the glory.

Between these lay the dark waters of the basin, seamed with faint, waving bars of light. Over them, like long black shadows, graceful gondolas slipped in silence, and electric launches with their fiery eyes crept across the vista.

From the roof of Music hall a wide pyramid of fierce white light was thrown upon the Administration dome. Its blazonry of yellow died away, and under the new glare the delicate, lace-like tracery of gold and white was brought into strong relief. From the roofs of the buildings of Manufactures and Agriculture twin search-lights beat down upon the MacMonnies fountain. Behind it the plaza was black with men, and its pure white figures shone as if carved from Parian marble.

Then the light was changed, and in a glory of crimson the ship Columbia, with its white-armed rowers, sailed on before the people. From his high pillar on either side, Neptune, leaning on his trident, looked down serenely. The search-lights swept the horizon, and for a moment graceful Diana loomed against the sky like a figure suspended in midair. At the east end of the basin the Golden Republic glittered against the night, lifting her golden eagle high above the crowd. Smoke from a passing engine rose about the dome of the Administration building, and its fiery outlines flickered and grew faint. The triumphant goddess seated high on the galley in the central fountain was bathed in a glory of green fire, and then yellow, changing again to its spotless white.

Under the great central entrance to Electricity building stood all the while the figure of an old-time Quaker. His eyes looked upward, and he held in his hand the feeble instrument which made possible the glories of this night. Franklin, with his kite, looked out upon the consummation of what he dreamt of when he drew lightning from the summer cloud. For two hours the "White City" blossomed in new beauty. The great basin was bathed in a flood of fairy moonlight. Outside the peristyle the lake beat its monotone against the walls. On the plaza the great orchestra of more than 100 men played patriotic music, and the people were filled and lifted with the spirit of the night.

The search light was a great surprise. It went dancing along the fronts of opposite buildings, climbed up the towers and brought out golden Diana. It flashed against the statue of the Republic, and kept it for a full minute resplendent as though carved from a block of flame and then flickered away, leaving the great figure in twilight uncertainty. After a time three irregular splashes of light were playing hide-and-seek along the basin and up the fronts of the big building. The lights changed their colors. Sometimes they were green and again they were blue or red.

While several thousand people were admiring this picture, a rocket of light shone out from one of the high corners of the agriculture building and flooded the MacMonnies fountain in a whiteness which made all the other light seem dim and lifeless. Under its focus the golden caravels and the draped figures showed strange contrasts of chalky pallor and deep shade. Only a moment later a second bar of light leaped out from a sky-high nook of the Manufactures building and swept the surface of the basin. It struck a moving gondola, and in a flash showed the gay Venetians bending to their long oars, the bright colors of the boat and the muffled forms of the passengers.

Johnny had left the others absorbed in their trance of delight. He sought other sights. Directly he came to the Electricity building, with its marvels of light. It burst on his childish mind, seeking for novelties, as greater than the scenes outside. It was something that Fanny and Uncle and Aunt must see. He ran in the greatest haste to bring them. When they came in, Johnny showed them where to sit to see the great illumination in the center of the building. It was then quite dark about them, but Johnny knew the marvelous sight he had said was there would soon appear.

Four rows of colored bulbs containing incandescent lights and placed on zig-zag frame works forty feet long in different directions are about a pillar around which are twined strings of two thousand electric bulbs of red, white and blue. The pillar is covered with bits of reflecting colored glass, thus making a magic intermingling of lights that almost rival the lightning in startling brilliancy and produce a pillar of fire scarcely surpassed even by that one which led the Israelites across the sea.

When the illumination came the weird ingenuity of the electric magicians struck Aunt Sarah with a sublimity almost more than she could endure. As the flashes of light struck out about the pillar and the ball of fire fell as if dropped from some creating hand she screamed, "O my God, what blasphemy is this that men have achieved. Can they snatch the fire from heaven and make the lightening a plaything?"

She sank upon a chair and gazed stupefied for some minutes at the awful scene. Then as they passed on she said, "I have seen the wonderful machinery great and small. I have seen the old relics which they say are the remains of men's hopes long gone by, but when man can take the light that comes out from the storms and put it up for show, it seems to me that I am seeing forbidden things and that the skill of men has gone too far."

At the next flash from the tower there was a shriek and a crowd began to gather about a man just across the hall. The cry came from a man who could receive the terrible grandeur but he did not have the strength of mind to sustain it.

He was gazing upon the incandescent globe-studded column, as in a trance, and again one of the electricians turned on the current and the shaft changed to living fire. The man seemed horrified by the unearthly beauty of the spectacle. It continued but a minute, when the current was turned off and the blinding light disappeared almost as suddenly as it had come.

A bystander whose attention happened to be directed toward him says that he stood gazing at the column for fully three minutes after the light had been turned off and that his countenance betrayed overwhelming bewilderment. Once or twice he raised a hand and drew it across his forehead. Then he was seen to press his temples with both palms, all the while gazing in an awe-stricken way at the great pillar. The attention of several visitors was attracted to the farmer, and one of them stepped to his side to inquire if anything was wrong with him. As the gentleman reached his side the latter threw his arms upward and, with a shriek that started the echoes, fell forward upon his face. Two or three guards rushed to the prostrate man's assistance, but before they reached his side he leaped to his feet and, screaming at the top of his voice, ran through the aisle toward the entrance facing the lagoon.

In a moment all was excitement, and the great crowd of visitors, becoming panic-stricken, ran in a dozen different directions or hid behind exhibits. The madman, pursued by a half-dozen guards, dashed down a side aisle and, leaping over boxes and machines, made a complete circuit of the General Electric company's exhibit and then paused again before the central column. Two guards seized him, but he threw them off as though they had been infants and again he started on a wild hurdle race through the building. He had not gone far when he tripped and fell, and in a moment three bluecoats were upon him.

Struggling and shrieking, the poor man was half led, half carried, to the north entrance of the building, where was waiting a patrol wagon. It required the combined strength of five guards to get the unfortunate man into the patrol wagon. Throughout the short drive to the patrol barn the prisoner fought like a wild animal and the officers had their hands full in keeping him aboard. When brought before the sergeant the prisoner became exceedingly quiet and spoke rationally while giving his name and address.

One of the guards then began to detail the offense of the prisoner. The recital had but just begun when the man became greatly excited and began screaming once more. The sergeant placed his hand in a kindly way upon his shoulder and gently forced him into a chair. The man grew quiet again and listened to the guard relate the story of the arrest without interruption. When the officer had finished the man arose and, walking up to the sergeant, said:

"Don't harm me, I didn't put all those bottles there. I'll tell you how it was. Somebody has stuck those bottles on that post and covered them up with a white cloth. When they raised the cloth the bottles turned to fire. I am not to blame. I don't know how those bottles came there. There are millions of them. They were all right at first, but the devils poured red fire into them. Don't hurt me. I had nothing to do with it."

The sergeant talked kindly to the man, and when he was quieted led him to the hospital, where a doctor attended to him. Here he entered into a long description of the pillar of "bottles," by which he evidently meant the incandescent globes. The doctor gave his patient a quieting potion, and in a short time he fell into a sleep. When he awoke from his sleep he was quiet, but his mind still dwelt on the pillar of "bottles," and he insisted on repeating his version of the affair to all the doctors. In the evening a carriage took the patient away, supposedly to the detention hospital.

_CHAPTER VII_

ON BOARD THE "ILLINOIS"

"Now for the battleship," said Johnny, "that's what I want to see." As they came on board the brick ship, the first words they heard were quite nautical.

"It's eight bells."

"Aye, aye, sir!"

The bos'un, or whoever it was that received the order from the Lieutenant, climbed up and tapped out eight strokes on the big brass bell. About twenty people, with lunch baskets and camp-chairs, ran after him and watched the performance.

"What's that for?" asked a young woman.

"That tells the time of day," answered her escort.

"But it's after 12 o'clock by my watch and he struck it only eight times."

"Well, they--ah--they have a system of their own. It's very complicated."

"Look at that crooked thing there," said one of the visitors, pointing to the air-tube leading to the stoker. "Is that their foghorn I've heerd about?"

"They don't need no foghorns on warships. I jedge it's a shootin'-iron of some kind or other, maybe a gattlin' gun what jest blows the shot out. You see it's pointin' out like at an enemy."

An elderly woman stepped up to the Lieutenant and said: "I'd like mighty well to see some of the Gatling guns."

"Yes, ma'am, you will find them at the foretop."

"How's that?"

"At the turret in the fore-top."

"Do you mean up in the little round cupola?"

"Cupola, great heavens," murmured the officer under his breath. Then he called a marine and had him show the woman to the fore-top. It is the experience of a lifetime for a naval officer who has cruised in the Mediterranean and rocked over the high waves of the south Atlantic to be placed in command of a brick battleship, which rests peacefully alongside a little pier and is boarded by hundreds of reckless sight-seers every day. The conning towers are of sheet-iron and some of the formidable guns are simply painted wood. It is said that if anything larger than a six-inch gun should be fired from the deck of the mimic battleship the recoil would upset the masonry and jolt the whole structure into a shapeless mass.

Below the water line the Illinois is a hollow mockery, but the two decks, the turrets and the heavy battery are made so realistic that any one who had not seen the brick laid and the plating put on might suppose it was a real war vessel that had stranded well in toward the beach. As a matter of fact, about one-third of the visitors are deceived, which fact may be vouched for by any one of the marines parading the deck. A man who looked as though he read the newspapers, called a sergeant of marines "Cap," and remarked that it was a very fine vessel.

"Yes, indeed, sir," replied the sergeant.

"She'll be here all summer, will she?"

"Oh, yes."

"Did this boat take part in the review at New York?"

"No, sir; this battleship is stuck fast here. It is a shell of brick, built up from a stone foundation, and is intended to represent a model battleship."

"You don't tell me. Made of brick, eh?" Uncle, listening to the talk, shared the countryman's disgust.

"There, Fanny, how do you excuse them for that piece of mockery? Everybody getting fooled as if they were in a cheap dime show. It's too bad the government should be a partner to sich deceptions. And then just hear them fellows making fun o' the likes o' us. It's a shame. Of course we hev to ask questions when they use all the art in the world to make deceiving things and then make fun if they do such good work as to fool us. We don't know any more about their work than they do about our farm. I guess they couldn't tell a Jersey from a short-horn, nor a header from a clover-huller."

One of the sailors was telling of the questions asked by the public. Some person asked him if the gulls flying around the ship were sea-gulls, and whether they had been brought on especially for the Fair. Another asked why the guns were plugged up at the end with pieces of wood. A marine said the plugs of wood made them air-tight, so that they wouldn't sink if they fell overboard. Maybe the man believed it. He didn't say anything.

From sight-seeing at the ship they came over to the Fisheries building.

The throng of visitors here at first detracted their sight from the wall of fish and wonders of the sea around them.

"Oh," said Aunt when she looked about, "I nearly have to gasp to make sure I'm not at the bottom of the sea. Just look at them fish swimming around on both sides of you."

"Well I feel sorry for these poor fish, they look so tired," said Fanny, "but it's very evident they can't keep lively all the time."

One of the big scaly-backed tarpons in the fountain was fanning his tail and moving slowly through the water. On the railing at the edge of the pool sat a tired man with a baby hanging over his arm. If the tarpon had stuck his nose out of the water he could have grabbed the man by the coat-tail and pulled him backward. The mother was standing a few feet away. She turned around and saw two beady eyes shining up through the water.

"Hold tight to that child," she said. "If you ever drop him that big pike would gobble him right up."

"He don't eat babies," replied the husband, calmly. "Besides, it ain't a pike; it's a sturgeon."

"Well, he looks awful mean, anyway." The husband, merely to reassure her, moved a few feet further along and let the baby lie over his shoulder and watch the little fish chase one another. The aisles were crowded full of people, who had found that a visit to the east end of the Fisheries building was almost as good as a dive to the bottom of the ocean.

It is in this place where you may stand with coral reefs and ring-tailed shells on either side and watch strange fish with spikes on their backs open their mouths and gape until each one looks like the letter O. The sea turtles stand on their heads and wave yellow flippers at the wide-eyed crowd, and a devil crab makes all the women shiver and pull the children away from the glass. In one aquarium there are so many catfish that they make the water cloudy.

In front of one of the cases there was a learned discussion. The label simply said "Anemone." On the rocks and shells were some things shaped like stars and mushrooms, except that they were moss-colored and had whiskers floating out in the water. "Annymone, what the dickens are they?" asked a man with a linen duster.

"Some kind of sea-weed, I believe," said an elderly gentleman in a patronizing manner.

"No, they ain't they're animals, broke in a third.

"But, sir, they are stuck fast there and can't move," said the elderly gentleman.

"I know that but they reach out with those whiskers and grab stuff and feed themselves that way."

"Well, that's the first time I ever heard of anything feedin' itself with its whiskers."

One of the young women looked at the sheepshead aquarium and murmured: "What long bills they have." Her escort smiled in a knowing way and said: "That is not a bill; that is a proboscis, I believe. I wish I had a hook and line."

A Columbian guard said he was tired of hearing the same old jokes, for nearly every young man who came in with a girl said: "When I come back here I'll bring a hook and line."

They finished the day here, and wearied with the noise and tumult of the streets were glad to find rest in their rooms when evening came.

The sweetness of this rural family was nowhere better to be seen than when they were resting at home in the evening after the fatiguing experiences of the day.