T 
 -gc 
 
 BIBS 
 
 
DRAWN BY W. T. 6MEDLEY. 
 
 IN THE WORLD'S FAIR GROUNDS AT CHICAGO THE ELECTRICAL BUILDING FROM THE LAKE. 
 
 [See " The Making of the White City." page 415.] 
 
 I ftP 
 
SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE. 
 
 VOL. XII 
 
 OCTOBER, 1892. 
 
 No. 4. 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 By H. C. Bunner. 
 
 THE ILLUSTRATIONS BY W. T. SMEDLET. 
 
 ON the shore of a wide, blue- 
 gray lake, under a northern sky, 
 veiled over half its horizon with a 
 dim, smoky mist, there spread, two 
 years ago, a waste and desolate 
 sand plain with a streak of marshy 
 pools in the heart of it. Here and 
 there were trunks of scrubby trees 
 and patches of starveling under- 
 brush ; but it had none of the 
 pleasant loneliness of the country- 
 side : the bleak desolation of a 
 great city's waste outskirts brood- 
 ed over the whole tract. On the 
 west the space was bounded by 
 the flat broad road-bed of a sub- 
 urban railroad ; eastward a strong 
 wall of ponderoiis masonry stood 
 between it and the sullen swash of 
 the inland sea. To the south it w ^~ 
 went out of sight in loneliness ; on 
 the north it narrowed to a point 
 where a great town had begun a 
 fight with nature for a few acres of 
 pleasure-ground, stubbornly pushing a 
 green covering of young trees and grass 
 across the unwilling sand. Beyond this 
 patch of verdure trailed out the city's 
 myriad streets, sparsely settled here, 
 for the town proper lay eight miles 
 away in the heart of the smoky haze 
 that floated along the sky-line. 
 
 In the month of June, 1891, a man 
 stuck the nose of a plough into the sand 
 of this plain, by way of beginning an 
 undertaking which lay before him, and 
 before some scores of thousands of 
 
 A Bit of Decoration. 
 
 working men all over the country 
 day - laborers, like himself ; iron -for- 
 gers, architects, truckmen, carpenters, 
 painters, surveyors, glaziers, designers, 
 moulders, joiners, masons, gardeners 
 men of every trade and art and handi- 
 craft, of every nationality, of every class 
 and kind of humanity, working together 
 in widely separate places for the ac- 
 complishment of one common purpose. 
 To-clay, in the prosecution of this under- 
 taking, the surface of that waste plain 
 has become the scene of one of the most 
 
 Copyright, 1892, by Charles Scribner's Sons. All rights reserved. 
 
400 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 marvellous manifestations of mechanical 
 achievement which the world has to 
 offer ; it is the site of such a group of 
 buildings as has never before been as- 
 sembled for such a purpose, on such a 
 scale, within such a time, and in such 
 conditions. It sounds like an extrava- 
 gance to say that within this space of 
 half a thousand acres is concentrated 
 the energy, the skill, the intelligence, the 
 activity, equipped with every material 
 
 quite inadequate to suggest the breadth 
 and range of design which make the 
 construction of the World's Fair Build- 
 ings at Chicago remarkable among the 
 great things done by modern engineers, 
 architects, and constructors ; for the 
 scale of the work forces us to new 
 standards of admeasurement. It is a 
 scale so unusual that the physical eye 
 is tricked until it finds for itself new 
 and specially applicable points of com- 
 
 The Exhibition Ground as it was in June, 1891. 
 
 requisite, that would suffice to build up 
 a large city in the space of three years ; 
 but to this plain statement of fact must 
 be added this other : that the city is 
 built. He who goes to that lake-side 
 desert a year from now will see, rising 
 from a gracious and well-ordered gar- 
 den, a white city of glass and iron, a 
 system of structures gigantic in plan 
 and scope beyond anything that science 
 has hitherto held feasible or desirable 
 for the sheltering of a multitude of 
 pleasure-seekers. 
 
 If you accept this statement literally, 
 it may convey to the mind a notion of 
 colossal achievement, and yet it may be 
 
 parisoii and appreciation. We may 
 know that the great central span of the 
 main building is the largest arched roof 
 in the world ; but the eye notes little 
 difference between the impression of 
 that huge arc and the picture that 
 memory reproduces of similar mighty 
 curves. Nor yet does the eye see more 
 understandingly when it compares the 
 monstrous bow with one of the insig- 
 nificant men who are making it. But 
 turn and look at the man on the top of 
 the next huge building ; establish a 
 scale of proportion between that man 
 and that building, and then another be- 
 tween the two buildings, and then you 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 401 
 
 Up Among the Great Iron Arches of the Hall of Manufactures. 
 
 obtain some idea of the magnitude of 
 the wonderful edifice which, rising 
 above and dominating all its fellows, 
 still leaves them individually huge and 
 imposing. Even so the mind must 
 grasp that idea by a scheme of com- 
 parison that seems strained, almost 
 whimsical and fantastic, forming men- 
 tal projections of such statistics as 
 these : The largest building hitherto 
 made for purpose of public exhibition, 
 namely, the Machinery Hall at Paris in 
 1889 could be placed under that span, 
 and, if provision were made for its sup- 
 port a few feet from the ground, the 
 entire population of the city of Mil- 
 waukee, which is over two hundred 
 
 thousand people, could be seated com- 
 fortably beneath it and there would 
 still be plenty of space to spare under 
 the arc of that main building that dom- 
 inates without dwarfing its fellows. 
 
 Of course, that such a great feat has 
 been accomplished in architectural con- 
 struction does not necessarily mean that 
 a good thing has been done as well as a 
 big thing. If it were the production of 
 an older civilization, it might involve or 
 imply some such guarantee of worth, 
 but in this country to talk thus of a 
 public work is sure to suggest the ac- 
 cusation of measuring art with a yard- 
 stick and architecture by the acre. It 
 would be easy enough to put our liberal 
 
402 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 Jackson Park now a Part of the Exhibition Grounds. 
 
 resources of technical skill, enterprise, 
 organization, and wealth into so stupen- 
 dous a work for no higher aim than to 
 gratify an ignorant vanity, and to no 
 happier end than our ultimate humilia- 
 tion and discouragement. Such things 
 have happened before in the history of 
 our progress, and a country like this 
 would be marked for premature decay 
 if such things did not happen in the 
 first two or three centuries of its lusty 
 youth. 
 
 When the conduct of the World's 
 Fair was allotted by Congress to the 
 city of Chicago, it cannot be denied 
 that there was a general fear, and that 
 there was generally good ground for 
 that fear, that Chicago's conception of 
 the housing of the World's Fair might 
 be more interesting for material breadth 
 than for aesthetic height ; and the fear 
 has certainly not been lessened by the 
 report of Chicago's adoption of the 
 Brobdingnagian scale. 
 
 Eighteen hundred and ninety-three 
 and the opening of the World's Fair 
 will come soon enough to show us 
 how well this country, represented by 
 
 her second greatest city, has assumed 
 the burden which the performance of 
 such a task imposes upon her loyalty to 
 art, her good taste and her catholicity 
 of interest, and those who form the 
 judgment of the world in such matters 
 will, if we may judge by experience, be 
 neither stinting in censure nor extrava- 
 gant in praise. It is not in any way 
 the object of this paper to forerun ma- 
 ture judgment or to forecast the value 
 of the finished work. It aims simply to 
 give some portrayal of a most interest- 
 ing phase and of a great and singular 
 activity, to sketch an imposing and be- 
 wildering work at its most significant 
 stage, and to show the lines on which 
 the men who have been chosen for the 
 mighty task are endeavoring to carry 
 out the behest of the state, and turn in 
 less than forty months a barren wilder- 
 ness into a garden of palaces to let the 
 work that is being done at Chicago 
 speak for itself. 
 
 It is necessary to turn first to one 
 page of the history of the Fair not the 
 page that tells of the extraordinary ex- 
 hibition of indecorum made at one time 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 403 
 
 by two great cities, each for itself, as 
 well as in their relations with each 
 other. No, the page we would turn to 
 bears pleasanter reading. It tells of 
 the doing of the biggest and best thing 
 that has yet been done in the whole 
 
 upon American civilization, in that it 
 was carried on with the brutal acrimony 
 of an English parliamentary campaign 
 and the sputtering hysteria of an inter- 
 pellation in the French Chamber of 
 Deputies. On the one side was an old 
 
 " No smoking! No cameras allowed on the grounds!" 
 
 business of the World's Fair of a big- 
 ger and better thing than the building 
 of the biggest and best temple of pleas- 
 ure that ever reared a white forehead 
 against a smoky sky. It is something, 
 too, that could only have been done in 
 America. 
 
 The quarrel which resulted in the 
 World's Fair going to Chicago was a 
 credit to neither of the two principal 
 contestants. It reflected unpleasantly 
 
 city old as age goes in this new world 
 with every facility for handling such 
 an affair, with experience in managing 
 and providing for crowds, and for fur- 
 nishing comfort and amusement, split 
 into two furious factions of anxious 
 citizens. Both factions wanted the 
 privilege of having the Fair ; what they 
 disagreed about was the propriety of 
 buying that privilege with the ruin of 
 an irreplaceable and perhaps an incom- 
 
404 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 parable park. On the other hand was 
 Chicago new, energetic, enthusiastic, 
 untrammelled with a unanimity of 
 opinion among her citizens that evoked 
 the praise and wonder of the world. 
 Such unanimity deserved the prize, and 
 won it. 
 
 But, face to face at last with the re- 
 sponsibility and the task, Chicago sat 
 down to consider coldly some of the lim- 
 itations of the usefulness of unanimity, 
 and to discern, perhaps, a certain spir- 
 itual significance in the difference of 
 opinion which had seemed almost in- 
 comprehensible when she saw it vexing 
 the disunited Eastern mind. There is 
 a unanimity that comes from the or- 
 dered training of many inteUects to 
 work for a single end. There is also 
 the unanimity which hails the ascending 
 rocket with the imitative hiss of admira- 
 tion. The course of that unanimity 
 during the further career of the rocket 
 has often been noted. 
 
 The undertaking she had in hand 
 necessarily brought with it the neces- 
 sity of considering certain problems 
 that could not but be new to a new civ- 
 ilization. Perhaps, more than any other 
 town, Chicago has made it her boast 
 that her equipment of energy, material, 
 and resource was always kept equal 
 to her demand upon it. Other cities 
 might have to wait for men, time, or 
 money to bring about a realization of 
 their dreams ; Chicago kept her force 
 of realizers always on duty and ready 
 for every emergency. Whatever she 
 wanted she had, and as soon as she 
 made up her mind that she wanted it 
 whether it was the tallest hotel in the 
 world or the system of express passen- 
 ger elevators needed to make fourteenth 
 story offices as accessible as those on 
 the third floor. 
 
 No doubt she made good her boast. 
 But her new obligation introduced her 
 to several wants which she had never 
 before had to consider, and which she 
 was wholly unprepared to meet. The 
 satisfaction of utilitarian requirements, 
 with a reasonable desire to give beauty a 
 fair show at the same time, had hitherto 
 been the formula of Chicago's artistic 
 growth. Even in the laying out of her 
 great parks she had attempted little more 
 than the forcing of an existent flatness 
 
 and monotony into a more agreeable 
 diversity of form and feature, yet while 
 this coaxing of a smile upon the dull 
 face of nature must be admired as a 
 clever performance under most trying 
 conditions, it cannot be held more than 
 a compromise with abstract beauty a 
 plucky attempt to wrest from an unwill- 
 ing soil the public playground's natural 
 birthright. The little artificial hills and 
 dales of Lincoln Park were, however, 
 Chicago's boldest essay for the sake, 
 primarily, of the aesthetic rather than 
 the useful. That is to say, for the 
 special work she had taken upon herself 
 she lacked not only the necessary special 
 preparation, but the situation she faced 
 was one unforeseen in her plan of life 
 and alien to the essential idea of her 
 self-education. Two courses lay open 
 to her ; to degrade the work to the level 
 of her own aptitude at the moment, or 
 to carry out her trust in the highest 
 spirit of loyalty and faithfulness, at 
 whatever cost to a local pride, that must 
 have been most sensitive, exacting, and 
 sanguine in the flush of recent victory. 
 Chicago probably has not as yet realized 
 the size of her achievement in adopting 
 the latter alternative ; it is not meas- 
 urable in stone-perches, but it is the 
 biggest thing in Chicago's list all the 
 same. 
 
 It must, however, be recorded with 
 regret that the recognition of the neces- 
 sity of outside help came as an after- 
 thought ; it was demonstrated, indeed, 
 by injudicious and unsuccessful at- 
 tempt. The valuable aid that w r as in- 
 voked came too late to deal with the 
 scheme of construction as a complete, 
 perfect, and independent whole. When 
 Chicago called the best architects and 
 landscape-gardeners to her aid they 
 found that a part of the task before 
 them was the co-ordination with their 
 own plans of certain features not of 
 their own origination. But it seems as 
 if the very difficulty of doing this had 
 added something to the enthusiasm and 
 determination with which they under- 
 took the work. Let us add that it was 
 the only important drawback they had 
 to encounter. The work that was 
 handed over was handed over without 
 reservation or restriction, and with their 
 authority they received the fullest pos- 
 
406 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 In Process of Construction (an Entrance of the Hall of Mines). 
 
 sible means of accomplishment and the 
 heartiest encouragement and assistance. 
 
 Perhaps the first thing that would 
 strike a stranger entering the World's 
 Fair grounds in the summer of 1892 
 would be the silence of the place, the 
 next the almost theatrical unreality of 
 the impression by the sight of an as- 
 
 semblage of buildings so startlingly out 
 of the common in size and form. 
 
 When I speak of the silence I mean 
 the effect of silence. There are seven 
 thousand and odd men at work, and 
 they are hammering and hauling and 
 sawing and filing as noisily as any other 
 workmen, but their noise is hardly no- 
 ticeable among these vast spaces. The 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 407 
 
 disproportion between the men and the 
 structures is so great that this army of 
 laborers looks like a mere random scat- 
 tering of human beings. Insensibly the 
 beholder gauges the amount of noise he 
 expects by the size of the work before 
 him, and is surprised at the insignifi- 
 cant effect of what he does hear. All 
 of this is part of that first impression 
 of unreality which I have spoken of as 
 almost theatrical. I might call it posi- 
 
 tively theatrical if I could at the same 
 time convey some sense of the effect of 
 certain daylight views of a great stage 
 decked with ambitious scenery. It is 
 not only the grouping of the huge white 
 and pale-yellow buildings that gives 
 this impression, although it is hard 
 enough to believe in that at first sight ; 
 for it cannot but suggest the extrava- 
 gant fancy that a dozen or so palaces 
 from distant lands some unmistakably 
 
 
 Before the Agricultural Building. 
 
408 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 out of the Arabian Nights have taken 
 a sudden fancy to herd together. There 
 are certain grotesque figures of the 
 method of construction that strikingly 
 heighten the general effect of strange- 
 ness. You watch two or three workmen 
 moving apparently aimlessly upon the 
 face of what seems a stupendous wall of 
 
 marble. Suddenly a pillar as tall as a 
 house rises in the air, dangling at the 
 end of a thin rope of wire. The three 
 little figures seize this monstrous showy 
 shaft and set it in place as though it 
 were a fence-post. Then a man with a 
 hand-saw saws a yard or two off it, and 
 you see that it is only a thin shell of 
 
 
 
 Near the Hall of Mines. The Great Arches of the Main Building (Hall of Manufactures) in the Distance. 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 409 
 
 
 The Administration Building. 
 
 stucco. As you adjust your perceptive 
 faculties you see, two hundred feet 
 above your head, the two halves of a 
 large arch of veritable iron come to- 
 gether, moved by unseen engines, as 
 noiselessly as though they were shadows 
 against the sky. 
 
 This is the first impression, and it is 
 one that comes back most readily to the 
 memory in after hours. But on the 
 spot it is shortly displaced by an 
 amazed perception of the vast activity 
 which informs the whole scene ; and an 
 unspeakable fascination seizes you as 
 you watch the working out of a great 
 fundamental idea. 
 
 " The whole thing is a sketch," said 
 one of its projectors ; and in a certain 
 
 sense it is a sketch, in lines of iron and 
 wash of plaster. This is not an acci- 
 dent ; it is the aspect, which, in the 
 opinion of the builders of the fair, a 
 group of buildings of this character 
 should present. All, or almost all, of 
 the structures must necessarily be tem- 
 porary and removable or convertible to 
 other uses. All must be of great size ; 
 all must be put up in a very limited 
 space of time. This involves the adop- 
 tion of the iron -frame system of con- 
 struction, and practically makes elabo- 
 rate internal decoration an impossibil- 
 ity. This situation has been frankly 
 accepted by the architects. They have 
 left it to the exhibits and their accesso- 
 ries to decorate the inside ; their own 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 411 
 
 task has been to make of walls and roofs 
 a picture pleasing in general composi- 
 tion and harmonious in detail. An iron 
 frame generally means an iron casing, 
 but to carry out a scheme like this it 
 was necessary to find some material less 
 obdurate, more easily handled and more 
 susceptible of artistic treatment. This 
 material was found in a combination of 
 plaster and jute fibre, called staff, which 
 combines adaptability to all forms of 
 plastic handling with a stiffness and 
 toughness almost like wood. This stuff 
 has made possible effects of construc- 
 tion which could never have been at- 
 tempted under the same conditions with 
 any other material. It is prepared as 
 quickly as water and plaster and fibre 
 can be mixed together ; it may be made 
 coarse or fine, rough or smooth in sur- 
 face as may be desired ; it may be cast 
 or molded ; it may be colored ; and 
 when it is dry and ready for use it is 
 handled almost exactly like wood 
 bored, sawed, and nailed. This, then, is 
 the wash in which the great sketch of the 
 White City is executed. It takes every 
 form that is necessary to clothe and or- 
 nament the iron skeletons ; it suggests 
 rather than simulates stone, and, consid- 
 ered for itself as a building material, it 
 has certain agreeable qualities of bright- 
 ness and softness. 
 
 It is of this material that all the mural 
 decorations of the Fair Buildings are 
 moulded, even to the statues, and it 
 lends itself with equal readiness to em- 
 bodying the graceful and somewhat 
 stern classicism of Mr. Philip Martiny's 
 slim, long - winged goddesses, or the 
 amazing and somewhat unaccountable 
 vehemence of the strange allegorical 
 family with which Mr. Karl Bitter is 
 decorating the finials of the Administra- 
 tion Building. 
 
 There is a strong contrast between 
 the clothing and the framework of the 
 building. The iron and woodwork em- 
 ployed are of unusual strength ; and 
 the iron castings are in some instances 
 wonders of scientific manufacture. For 
 instance, in setting up the preposter- 
 ously huge trusses of tlae main building 
 it had not, up to June, 1892, been found 
 necessary to re-drill a single rivet-hole 
 which testifies to a miracle of con- 
 structive calculation at the distant foun- 
 
 dries where these great masses of iron 
 were shaped. 
 
 The whole business of construction 
 has been reduced to a system original in 
 
 Model for Statue of the Republic, by Daniel C. French. 
 
 many respects, and peculiarly applica- 
 ble to the needs of the time and place, 
 the main idea being to make of the con- 
 struction an art by itself, leaving to the 
 architect only the responsibility of ar- 
 tistic design. As Mr. Frank D" Millet, 
 the right-hand man of Chief-Constructor 
 Burnham, tersely puts it : " We give our 
 constructors a picture and the dimen- 
 sions, and say, 'Make that!" : And 
 even to Mr. Millet, who has helped in 
 almost every World's Fair for the last 
 
DRAWN BY W. T. SMEDLEY. 
 
 Lunch Time. 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 413 
 
 twenty years, this is a new step in the 
 progress of architecture. 
 
 With this possibility of quickly and 
 inexpensively modelling the exteriors of 
 the buildings at will, it became also pos- 
 sible to the designers to attempt a bold 
 effect of harmony and balance in the 
 grouping of the structures, and to make 
 the individuality of each building fit 
 in with one underlying design which 
 should at once appeal to the eye and to 
 the memory, so that the thought of any 
 part at once brings to mind its position 
 and significance in the whole scheme. 
 To some extent, of course, those feat- 
 ures which they found themselves 
 obliged to accept at the inception of 
 their task have interfered with the 
 carrying out of this plan in its absolute 
 completeness ; but the interference has 
 been far less than might have been ex- 
 pected. 
 
 It may certainly be said that the least 
 observant of visitors can hardly fail to 
 grasp and retain some conception of 
 the simple and effective ground-plan 
 which unites this impressive collection 
 of buildings, in the course of a single 
 progress through the grounds. If he 
 comes in by the main entrance, the idea 
 of order and system is presented to him 
 at the very outset. All the entering 
 railroads converge here to a single per- 
 ron, or platform, in front of which 
 stands a square building, surmounted 
 by a gilded dome. This is the Admin- 
 istration Building, designed by Richard 
 M. Hunt, of New York. It is placed 
 here to serve a double purpose, to form 
 a vestibule to the Fair of impressive 
 and symmetrical dignity and beauty, 
 and to show the new-comer on his ar- 
 rival the headquarters of control and 
 management, tinder this shining dome 
 he passes to what may be called the 
 grand court of the Exhibition, a mighty 
 quadrangle, flanked on either side by 
 towering white facades, and bounded at 
 its farther end by a majestic peristyle 
 raising its long array of columns against 
 the clear background of an enclosed 
 harbor. An artificial lake or basin of 
 water occupies the greater part of this 
 quadrangle, at its head stretching out 
 into a long transept of canals, the north- 
 erly arm connecting with a long, irregu- 
 larly-shaped lagoon at whose farthest- 
 VOL. XII. -46 
 
 end the pillared front of a classic tem- 
 ple rises from the water's very edge. In 
 the angle formed by these two water- 
 vistas stands the mammoth among 
 buildings, the Hall of Manufactures and 
 Liberal Arts, stretching a third of a 
 mile along the water- side. 
 
 It is the southwestern or perhaps it 
 would be more accurate to say the 
 southern corner of this stupendous 
 pile that centres the whole ground plan 
 and fixes in the mind the relation of its 
 principal parts. The southern facade, 
 covering the whole stretch from the 
 canal to the lake, forms the most im- 
 portant boundary of the central plaza, 
 while its longer frontage looks west- 
 ward over canal and lagoon upon the 
 broad park-land where lie, irregularly 
 disposed, the buildings not included in 
 the main group. Thus he who stands 
 in front of this corner, at the point 
 where canal and basin join, sees to his 
 right and to his left the two essential 
 divisions of the general design the 
 court scheme and the champaign 
 scheme and the thought must strike 
 him that in their combination, in a pro- 
 portion suggested on the one hand by 
 the breadth and on the other by the 
 length of the grounds, the possibilities 
 of the site have been practically ex- 
 hausted. 
 
 We must not forget the peculiar char- 
 acter of that site. Almost triangular 
 in shape, it was, save for a few marshy 
 hollows, as flat as a parade-ground. It 
 lacked utterly the relief of rock or hill 
 or woodland grove, or even of gracious 
 slopes and terraces. The city lent it 
 no architectural background. Whatever 
 was to be done with it had to be done 
 with the materials at hand. Under 
 such conditions the best thing to be 
 tried for was to make the landscape an 
 attractive and appropriate setting for 
 the buildings, whose size and impor- 
 tance could not but be exaggerated by 
 the character of their surroundings. 
 Here came in the idea of employing 
 water as the effective feature of this 
 setting, and in so broad and liberal a 
 manner as not only to heighten the 
 cliarm of the architect's work, but to 
 afford a positive novelty in stretching 
 throughout the ground a system of 
 canals and channels navigable for pleas- 
 
414 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 ure-boats of making, in fact, a water- 
 show in the very heart of the land-show. 
 Through the greater part of the triangu- 
 lar plain the body of water created to 
 this end wanders in graceful and natural 
 curves, doubling on itself, stretching 
 out in pleasant reaches, pushing an arm 
 here, a bay there, sweeping around 
 islands large and small ; fringed its 
 whole length in every bend and inlet 
 with the simple and ever lovely flora of 
 the inland water-side iris, pond-lily, 
 hellebore, sedge-grass, arrowhead, sweet 
 flag, and bulrush and set around with 
 clustering thickets, and long lines of 
 those lowly and grateful willows that 
 ask only a plenteous draught of water 
 to show their pearly gray-greens from 
 the first stirring of the sap till the com- 
 ing of the Fall. 
 
 This has been the work of Mr. Henry 
 Sargent Codman, the partner of Mr. 
 F. L. Olmstead, and it is easier to ad- 
 mire his success than to realize the dif- 
 ficulties under which he has labored. 
 He has laid under contribution all the 
 lakeside country within many miles of 
 Chicago, ransacking ponds and marshes 
 for suitable stock for transplantation, 
 and making his selections with rare 
 skill and judgment. But the setting 
 out of plants and shrubs by the scores 
 of thousands has been only one part 
 of Mr. Codman's arduous duties. He 
 found for his field of usefulness a flat 
 sand-plain with some three or four 
 inches of superficial soil light, friable 
 loam, excellent for quick growth and 
 not on any account to be wasted. He 
 removed this top-coating of soil, piled 
 it up temporarily in convenient places, 
 dug his lagoons and canals out of the 
 sand-plain, and then spread his stored- 
 up loam back in the places where he 
 wanted lawns and terraces and thickets 
 and bosky islands. That is to say, he 
 skinned his subject, remodelled its 
 contours, and put the skin back. 
 
 As it comes before the mighty front 
 of the Main Building, this wander- 
 ing stream is caught and held with- 
 in bounds, until, submissively gliding 
 amid the confines of artificiality, curved 
 and arched and trimmed to line and 
 angle, it plays its part in the great pa- 
 rade of the court square. 
 
 The picture of which it forms a part 
 
 the picture of the great quadrangle is 
 one not easily forgotten, even when it is 
 seen in the crude bareness of its un- 
 finished line ; when only the superb and 
 Avell-balanced lines of the half-sheathed 
 buildings bound its broad spaces and 
 spread their long roof-lines against the 
 cold sky. It will be more striking, per- 
 haps, when it gets on its holiday drapery 
 of flags and awnings, of splashing foun- 
 tains and green parterres made gay 
 with flowers ; or seen at night, in the 
 wonderful dress of electric light that is 
 being woven for it, an astounding 
 tracery of fire that is to outline every 
 niche and corner and pillar, every balus- 
 trade and terrace-edge, down to the 
 water-line, where a triplicate row of 
 lights, mirrored in the shining depths, 
 will map out the margin of the basin ; 
 while from time to time the startling, 
 all-revealing glare of the lake-side 
 search-lights travels across the whole 
 enclosure the bull's-eye lantern of our 
 familiar electrical giant. And yet, fine 
 as is the theatre it presents for splendid 
 pageantry of this sort, to those who 
 have seen it in the last stage of its 
 growth the trappings may only cost the 
 great square something of the simple 
 dignity it derives from the architectural 
 strength and just proportions of the 
 buildings which wall it in. Properly 
 speaking, the whole space is one broad 
 avenue from the railroad terminus to 
 the Lake, for two-thirds of its length 
 practically a water-way, with the Ad- 
 ministration Building planted squarely 
 midway of the remaining third ; but to 
 view it from a point in the water-way 
 is inevitably to pick out three buildings 
 as salient boundaries the main build- 
 ing, known as the Manufactures and 
 Liberal Arts Building, the Administra- 
 tion Building, and the Agricultural 
 Hall. In the first case it is pre-emi- 
 nently the aggressive size that attracts 
 the eye, in the second it is the applica- 
 tion of a striking form to a peculiarly 
 appropriate situation ; in the third what 
 captivates the attention is simply the 
 charm of a beautiful design ideally well 
 displayed. Seen, as it must first be 
 seen, across the water ; in an unbroken 
 perspective against the clearest quarter 
 of the sky, so disposed as to be free 
 from the dwarfing influences of any 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 415 
 
 other building or group of buildings, 
 its candid classicism receives every ad- 
 vantage that situation can give it, and 
 the eye turns from the effect of breadth 
 and mass in the main building opposite 
 to the calm beauty of its graceful detail 
 with a sense of grateful and natural 
 transition, recognizing a certain com- 
 plementary relation between the differ- 
 ent kinds of dignity expressed in the 
 huge structures. 
 
 But if these three buildings offer the 
 most characteristic and unforgettable 
 fayades of the square, it is not to be 
 supposed that the rest of the group of 
 giants fail in effectiveness or adequacy 
 in the matter of external appearance. 
 On the contrary, they carry out admi- 
 rably the idea of restriction to healthy 
 classical lines, which, by mutual con- 
 sent, has governed the designers of the 
 whole group ; while they offer, individ- 
 ually, an ample diversity of thought and 
 treatment. But their position, at the 
 inland end of the court., presenting their 
 main entrances to the Administration 
 Building, has been governed in some 
 measure by the exigencies of their use. 
 
 On the southerly side stands, with its 
 annex, the Machinery Hall, designed by 
 Messrs. Peabody & Stearns of Boston, 
 covering in all a space of ground some 
 fourteen hundred by five hundred feet. 
 On the northerly side are the Hall of 
 Mines, and Mining, and the Electrical 
 Building, so called ; buildings almost 
 twins in size (about seven hundred by 
 three hundred and fifty feet each), but 
 sharply differing in design the Hall of 
 Mines, with its massiveness of design 
 and detail, and the Palace of Electricity, 
 raising on high its almost fantastically 
 broken sky-line. The one is the work 
 of Mr. S. S. Beman, the other of Messrs. 
 Van Brunt & Howe, of Kansas City. 
 Outside of these, or rather, around the 
 corner from them is the Transportation 
 Building, a vast hall running nearly five 
 hundred feet each way from the impos- 
 ing Roman arch, with its florid half- 
 oriental decoration, which forms its main 
 entrance. This edifice stands as a sort 
 of connecting link between the serried 
 ranks of the quadrangle buildings, and 
 those which are ranged in " open order " 
 around the water space, in the middle 
 of the champaign or park-like portion of 
 
 the grounds. These are, in the order of 
 their position : The Horticultural Hall, 
 the Women's Pavilion, the Illinois State 
 Building, the permanent Building of the 
 Institute of Art (around and beyond 
 which are the smaller headquarters of 
 the various States and foreign nations), 
 and then, returning on the lakeward 
 side of the lagoon, the Fisheries Build- 
 ing and the United States Government 
 Exhibition Quarters, which comprise a 
 large building, and at the lake shore an 
 enclosed harbor for the naval exhibit. 
 Here the long ellipse reaches the north- 
 erly end of the main building, and thus 
 connects with the base of construction 
 formed by the great court, and that 
 coign of vantage at the confluence of 
 basin and canal from which the eye first 
 takes in the whole broad and varied 
 scheme. 
 
 It is from this point that a compre- 
 hensive view must be taken of the ar- 
 rangement as a whole, and of the har- 
 mony or discordance of its several parts. 
 Of the quadrangle it may be said that 
 from the layman's point of view criti- 
 cism would be hypercriticism. What- 
 ever individual taste or scholarship may 
 find to question or reject in the details 
 of this marvellous plaza, with its throng- 
 ing faades, its spacious water-ways, its 
 treasures of columns and fountains ; 
 the people who go out to see a great 
 and beautiful sight would be mean and 
 ungracious if they sought to weaken by 
 ungenerous analysis the satisfying im- 
 pression of grandeur and beauty, and 
 of eminent fitness and good taste, pro- 
 duced by the whole picture. It is a 
 noble design, broadly conceived, and 
 carried out with an amazing amount of 
 patient skill and conscientious thought. 
 
 To turn to the other and longer vista 
 of the water parkway is to see how sad- 
 ly the interference of lower standards 
 can mar the complete execution of an 
 exquisite, artistic design. For almost 
 a mile the eye travels the delightfully 
 diversified length of the beautiful water- 
 way which Messrs. Olmsted & Codman 
 have laid out, to rest at last upon the 
 almost sacredly classic front of the great 
 Art Building, calm and pure in its 
 beauty as the waters of the lake from 
 which it rises. It is a beauty of line 
 and proportion rather than of decora- 
 
416 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 tion, a beauty of balance and modula- 
 tion, a beauty which must be seen in 
 its completeness, undisturbed by any 
 other spectacle, if you would feel the 
 full delight of its serenity. And right 
 here, across full half of the western end, 
 the Illinois State Building thrusts an 
 unseemly and ill-bred shoulder into the 
 view, like a dry goods emporium affront- 
 ing a Greek temple. 
 
 There is another building in the way 
 on the eastern side, but it neither 
 affronts nor offends. This is the Fish- 
 eries Building, designed by Mr. Henry 
 Ives Cobb, and its delicate pavilions, 
 with their clean, significant fines, and 
 their airy, skyward lift, take gracefully 
 a subordinate part in the picture and 
 relieve a severity with which they are 
 in no wise out of keeping. Joyousness 
 is the keynote of Mr. Cobb's design ; 
 his is a happy concept for a people's 
 summer pleasure-house, and he per- 
 mits himself something like an approach 
 to architectural humor in his grotesque 
 decorations of conventionalized forms 
 of fishes and crustaceans. It may be 
 objected that the primary purpose of 
 the building is scientific, but to this it 
 should be urged that ichthyology is a 
 science which it is hard to disconnect 
 from a certain fantastic curiosity, and 
 that, in spite of what the learned have 
 said, the humor-loving human being 
 will never take fish quite seriously and 
 moreover, that the man who conceives a 
 design so wholly delightful in spirit as 
 Mr. Cobb's, need make no more apology 
 for the lightsomeness of his art than he 
 does for the gracefulness of it. 
 
 Across a lake from the Fisheries 
 Building is the Building of the United 
 States Government, which promises to 
 be one of the most valuable and impor- 
 tant exhibits in the whole Fair. It 
 ought to illuminate the soul of even a 
 Congressman from Darkest Kansas with 
 new lights on the selection and compen- 
 sation of government architects. 
 
 The Horticultural Hall, which is the 
 largest building of the park group, is 
 sufficiently imposing in point of size, but 
 disappointing in its heavy and earth- 
 bound lines, the ponderous effect of 
 which is accented by the unnecessarily 
 broad frieze which swathes the building 
 like a wide bandage. It is, however, only 
 
 fair to say for Mr. Jenny's building that 
 considerations of interior effect have had 
 more weight than in the case of any 
 other edifice (except, perhaps, the Admin- 
 istration Building) ; his highly colored 
 courts being made a characteristic feat- 
 ure. 
 
 It is impossible to avoid speaking of 
 certain unsatisfactory points in this part 
 of the exhibition impossible because 
 the very high standard of achievement 
 established elsewhere provokes the un- 
 complimentary comparison. Yet it must 
 not be forgotten that such criticism is, 
 after all, only comparative. It is mainly 
 because so much has been done thor- 
 oughly well, that the element of dissat- 
 isfaction seems unduly irritant. To use 
 the consoling axiom of Charles Reade's 
 humble publicist, " Where there's a mul- 
 titude there's a mixture ; " and it was 
 inevitable that in a work so vast some 
 parts should be on a lower plane than 
 others, both in conception and execu- 
 tion. The thing to be wondered at is 
 that this undertaking could have gone 
 so far as it has without developing more 
 positive evidence of bad taste or lack of 
 skill. Every World's Fair, I suppose, 
 must have its "lolanthe in Butter," and 
 perhaps lolanthe has her place in the 
 art-education of a people. If she has, 
 it may be incidentally remarked that 
 ample provision has been made for fill- 
 ing her place in this instance. There 
 is a modern and realistic rilievo at the 
 base of the great entrance of the Trans- 
 portation Building, which does the com- 
 pletest justice to the Pullman-car end of 
 our civilization. 
 
 I have endeavored to give some idea 
 of what shape and form the World's 
 Fair enterprise had taken to the appre- 
 hension of the physical eye in the 
 month of June, 1892, without attempt- 
 ing to discount the future, or to do more 
 than lay before my readers a very brief 
 and untechnical description of a sight 
 that moved me, as I think it must have 
 moved any American who saw it as I 
 did, to a deep interest and honest en- 
 thusiasm. It has been a pleasant but 
 a trying task, and how full it has been 
 of temptations to error and to exagger- 
 ation can only, I think, be understood 
 by the man, who, as a boy, has peered 
 
THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 417 
 
 through a hole in the circus tent, and 
 whispered to his wide-eyed companions 
 a fragmentary and hurried account of 
 the dazzling show in process of prepa- 
 ration. He, I know, will forgive me, if 
 I have shown more earnestness than art 
 in striving to picture to him the effect 
 produced by this strange assemblage 
 of beautiful, gracious, and inspiriting 
 architectural forms at the first sight 
 of the unfinished White City of Pal- 
 aces. 
 
 It has been difficult to convey the ef- 
 fect of what has been done : it would 
 be impossible to convey the effect of the 
 doing of it. It is a great exhibition in 
 itself the concentration of human en- 
 ergy and intelligence which has made 
 this work possible. The men who are 
 doing it are gathered together from dis- 
 tant cities, and for the months or years 
 that their task may require of them, 
 they have given themselves up as abso- 
 lutely as soldiers give themselves to 
 their duty. It is, in fact, an army of 
 laborers with a staff of artists and archi- 
 tects that is under the command of Mr. 
 D. H. Burnham, the Chief of Construc- 
 tion, a man born for generalship, strong 
 in executive ability and in the capacity 
 
 for inspiring loyalty and devotion. It 
 is through his constructive and execu- 
 tive genius that the admirably able 
 corps of architects and designers gath- 
 ered together at Chicago are enabled to 
 realize their splendid fancies in all the 
 strength of their ambition. Within 
 the walls of the great enclosure these 
 men lead, for months at a time, the life 
 of military officers in the conduct of 
 a campaign, living in barracks, their 
 days' work beginning with their waking 
 and ending only with too long deferred 
 sleep. 
 
 They have worked so hard and so 
 long together, at home and on this sandy 
 plain, that, like all old comrades of war, 
 they have a talk of their own, and 
 among themselves they sometimes speak 
 of a certain "microbe," the germ of 
 something which, with soldierlike lev- 
 ity, they figure as a disease the enthu- 
 siasm the uncontrollable, action-im- 
 pelling enthusiasm for their great en- 
 terprise which sustains them through 
 this long strain on body and mind ; the 
 enthusiasm which seizes upon all who 
 watch them at their grand toil, and 
 which I wish were mine to communi- 
 cate in telling of what they are doing. 
 
 STATISTICAL NOTES OF THE WORLD'S FAIE BUILDINGS AT CHICAGO. 
 
 (These figures are approximately correct, within a foot or so ; fractions are suppressed for the sake 
 of simplicity ; and allowance must be made for slight alterations in plan.) 
 
 THE GROUNDS are a little less than a mile-and-a-half in length. In width they are 
 about a third of a mile at the narrow end, and about four-fifths of a mile at the broad or 
 south end. Speaking roughly, this is about equivalent to as much of the lower end of 
 New York City as would be separated from the upper portion by a line drawn from the 
 foot of Canal Street and North River to the foot of Rutgers Street and East River. 
 They contain more than half a thousand acres, exclusive of the Midway Plaisance, an an- 
 nex running eastward behind the Women's Pavilion. 
 
 THE MAIN COTJRT, Plaza or Cour d'Honneur is a quadrangle 2,000 by 700 feet. It con- 
 tains the Great Basin, 1,100 by 350 feet ; the MacMonnies Fountain, the centre-piece of a 
 basin 150 feet in diameter ; and terminates at the lake end in the Peristyle designed by 
 Mr. C. B. Atwood, which is 60 feet high and is composed of four rows of pillars. 
 
 THE MANUFACTURES AND LIBERAL ARTS BUILDING is 1,687 by 787 feet in size. It 
 covers about thirty-one acres. The great main roof covers an area 1,400 by 385 feet, and 
 has an extreme height of 210 feet. This is between 55 and 60 feet higher than the Great 
 Arch of the Machinery Building in the recent Paris Exposition. It is only 10 feet less 
 in height than the great chimney of the New York Steam-Heating Company. It is just 6 
 feet lower than the top of the spire of Grace Church, New York. It is 11 feet lower 
 than the Bunker Hill shaft at Boston. It would hold the Vendome column mounted on 
 a 74 foot pedestal. The seating capacity of the building is estimated at over 200,000 
 people. St. Peter's at Rome holds about 54,000, St. Paul's in London less than 26,000, 
 and the Metropolitan Opera House in New York has a capacity of 5,000 people. The 
 entrances to this building are 40 feet wide by 80 feet high. Its ground plan is much more 
 
418 
 
 THE MAKING OF THE WHITE CITY. 
 
 than twice the size of that of the Pyramid of Cheops. It is the better part of a hundred 
 feet longer than the main span of the Brooklyn Bridge. It is nearly two and one-half 
 times as long and more than two and one-half times as wide as the Capitol at Washington. 
 The architect is Mr. George B. Post, of New York. 
 
 THE AGRICULTURAL BUILDING is 800 by 500 feet. Its central dome is 130 feet in 
 height and 100 in diameter. The corner domes are between 90 and 100 feet high. The 
 cornice-line is 65 feet high.* Messrs. McKim, Meade & White are the architects. 
 The statuary adornments of the building are designed by Mr. Philip Martiny. The 
 annex to this building is 550 by 300 feet. 
 
 THE MACHINERY HALL is 846 by 492 feet. Its annex 550 by 490 feet. These dimen- 
 sions do not include boiler house, machine house, etc. The architects are Messrs. Pea- 
 body & Stearns, of Boston. 
 
 THE ADMINISTRATION BUILDING is 260 feet square. The dome is 275 feet high exter- 
 nally ; the internal dome is 190 feet in height. That is, it is about as high on the out- 
 side as Trinity Church spire in New York. The dome of the Capitol at Washington is 
 287 feet in height, and internally considerably smaller than that of this building. Mr. 
 Richard M. Hunt, of New York, is the architect ; Mr. Karl Bitter, the statuary. 
 
 THE HALL OP MINES AND MINING is 700 by 300 feet, and the architect is Mr. S. S. Be- 
 man, of Chicago. 
 
 THE ELECTRICAL BUILDING is 690 by 345 feet. The four corner towers are 169 feet 
 high. The longitudinal nave is 115 feet wide by 114 feet high. Messrs. Van Brunt & 
 Howe, of Kansas City, are the architects. 
 
 THE TRANSPORTATION BUILDING is 960 by 256 feet, with a one-story annex covering 
 about 9 acres. The cupola is 165 feet in height. Messrs. Adler & Sullivan, of Chicago, 
 are the architects. 
 
 THE HORTICULTURAL BUILDING is 998 by 250 feet. The dome is 187 feet in diameter 
 and 113 feet high. Mr. W. L. B. Jenny, of Chicago, is the architect. 
 
 THE WOMAN'S PAVILION is 388 by 199 feet. The architect is Miss Sophia G. Hayden, 
 of Chicago. 
 
 THE BUILDING OF THE INSTITUTE OF FINE ARTS (permanent) is 500 by 320 feet, with a 
 dome 125 feet high. The architect is Mr. C. B. Atwood. 
 
 THE FISHERIES BUILDING is over 1,000 feet in extreme length, the main building 
 being 365 by 165 feet, flanked by two circular pavilions, each 135 feet in diameter, con- 
 nected by arcades. Its water capacity is 140,000 gallons, exclusive of reservoirs. The 
 architect is Mr. Henry Ives Cobb. 
 
 OTHER BUILDINGS are the Dairy Building, 200 by 95 feet ; the Government Building, 
 415 by 345 feet ; the Forestry Building, 500 by 200 feet ; the Stock Pavilion, 440 by 280 
 feet, and the Illinois Building, 450 by 160. 
 
 By general agreement among the architects, 65 feet is accepted as the standard height of the main fat ade in 
 most of the buildings. 
 
 Going Home from Work. 
 
STORIES OF A WESTERN TOWN. 
 
 691 
 
 two things she wanted, and one I did 
 want myself ; but the other I couldn't 
 seem to bring my mind to it, no any- 
 how ! We hadn't any children but one 
 that died four years ago, a little baby. 
 Ever since she died my wife has had a 
 longing to have a stained-glass window, 
 with the picture, you know, of Christ 
 blessing little children, put into our 
 little church. In Memoriam, you know. 
 Seems as if, now we've lost the baby, we 
 think -all the more of the church. May- 
 be she was a sort of idol to us. Yes, 
 sir, that's one thing my wife fairly 
 longed for. We've saved our money, 
 what we could save ; there are so many 
 calls ; during the sickness, last winter, 
 the sick needed so many things, and it 
 didn't seem right for us to neglect them 
 just for our baby's window ; and the 
 money went. The other thing was dif- 
 ferent. My wife has got it into her 
 head I have a fine voice. And she's 
 higher church than I am ; so she has 
 always wanted me to intone. I told 
 her I'd look like a fool intoning, and 
 there's no mistake about it, I do ! But 
 she couldn't see it that way. It was 
 'most the only point wherein we dif- 
 fered ; and last spring, when she was so 
 sick, and I didn't know but I'd lose her, 
 it was dreadful to me to think how I'd 
 crossed her. So, Mr. Lossing, when 
 she got well I promised her, for a thank- 
 offering, I'd intone. And I have ever 
 since. My people know me so well, and 
 we've been through so much together, 
 that they didn't make any fuss though 
 they are not high fact is, I'm not high 
 myself. But they were kind and con- 
 siderate, and I got on pretty well at 
 home ; but when I came to rise up in 
 that great edifice, before that cultured 
 and intellectual audience, so finely 
 dressed, it did seem to me I could not 
 do it ! I was sorely tempted to break 
 my promise. I was, for a fact." He 
 drew a long breath. "I just had to 
 pray for grace, or I never would have 
 pulled through. I had the sermon my 
 wife likes best with me ; but I know it 
 lacks it lacks it isn't what you need ! 
 I was dreadfully scared and I felt mis- 
 erable when I got up to preach it and 
 
 then to think that you were but it is 
 the Lord's doing and marvellous in our 
 eyes ! I don't know what Maggie will 
 say when I tell her we can get the 
 window. The best she hoped was I'd 
 bring back enough so the church could 
 pay me eighteen dollars they owe on 
 my salary. And now it's wonderful ! 
 Why, Mr. Lossing, I've been thinking 
 so much and wanting so to get that 
 window for her, that, hearing that the 
 dean wanted some carpentering done, 
 I thought maybe, as I'm a fair carpen- 
 ter that was my trade once, sir I'd 
 ask him to let me do the job. I waa 
 aware there is nothing in our rules I 
 mean our canons to prevent me, and 
 nobody need know I was the rector of 
 Matin's Junction, because I would come 
 just in my overalls. There is a cheap 
 place where I could lodge, and I could 
 feed myself for almost nothing, living 
 is so cheap. I was praying about that, 
 too. Now, your noble generosity will 
 enable me to donate what they owe on 
 my salary, and get the window too ! " 
 
 " Take my advice," said Harry, " do- 
 nate nothing, say nothing about this 
 gift ; I will take care of the warden, and 
 I can answer for the dean." 
 
 " Yes," said the dean, " on the whole, 
 Gilling, you would better say noth- 
 ing, I think ; Mr. Lossing is more 
 afraid of a reputation for generosity 
 than the small-pox." 
 
 The older man looked at Harry with 
 glistening eyes of admiration ; with 
 what Christian virtues of humility he 
 was endowing that embarrassed young 
 man, it is painful to imagine. 
 
 The dean's eyes twinkled above his 
 handkerchief which hid his mouth, as 
 he rose to make his farewells. He 
 shook hands, warmly. " God bless 
 you, Harry," said he. Gilling, too, 
 wrung Harry's hands ; he was seeking 
 some parting word of gratitude, but he 
 could only choke out, " I hope you will 
 get married some time, Mr. Lossing, 
 then you'll understand." 
 
 "Well," said Harry, as the door 
 closed, and he flung out his arms and 
 his chest in a huge sigh, "I do be- 
 lieve it was better than the puppies ! " 
 
THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 By F. D. Millet. 
 
 f HE grand style, 
 the perfect pro- 
 portions, and 
 the magnificent 
 dimensions o f 
 the buildings of 
 the World's Co- 
 lumbian Expo- 
 sition, excite a 
 twofold senti- 
 ment in the 
 mind of the vis- 
 itor wonder and admiration at the 
 beauties of the edifices, and regret and 
 disappointment that they are not to re- 
 main as monuments to the good taste, 
 knowledge, and skill of the men who 
 built them, and as a permanent memo- 
 rial of the event which the Exposition 
 is intended to celebrate. This complex 
 feeling is a natural one, and is perfect- 
 ly comprehensible in the presence of 
 the noble porticos and colonnades, the 
 graceful towers, superb domes, and im- 
 posing fa9ades. Previous exhibitions, 
 with the possible exception of that in 
 Vienna in 1873, have been confessedly 
 ephemeral in the character of their con- 
 struction, and have shown a distinctly 
 playful and festal style of architect- 
 ure, with little attempt at seriousness 
 or dignity of design. The monumental 
 character of the group of Exposition 
 buildings in Chicago is not the result 
 of accident, but of deliberate fore- 
 thought and wise judgment. 
 
 In the heat of the fever of construc- 
 tion, which has spread like a contagion 
 from the rocks of .Mount Desert to the 
 white sands of the Pacific coast, a new 
 race of architects; has sprung up, fer- 
 tile in resources and clever in execu- 
 tion, but with little well-grounded 
 knowledge of the real principles of 
 their art. Beginning with the bulbous 
 conglomerations of material which have 
 been forced upon a long-suffering pub- 
 lic by the Government architects, and 
 ending with consciously picturesque 
 structures that hint more of the ter- 
 
 rors of mediaeval dungeons than of the 
 comforts of domestic life, and bear the 
 title of villa but the aspect of milita- 
 ry strongholds, the architecture of the 
 past two decades has, with some nota- 
 ble exceptions, been distinguished by in- 
 creasing ingenuity in imitation rather 
 than the development of skill in adap- 
 tation. It would be w r orse than fool- 
 ish to demand that an architect should 
 be thoroughly original, as it would be 
 to ask an artist to cut loose from all 
 the proven principles and traditions of 
 his profession, and invent an entirely 
 new method and a novel system. What 
 may be reasonably asked of an archi- 
 tect is that he have an individual point 
 of view, and modernize the adaptation 
 of old principles without disturbing 
 the real spirit of the same ; that he de- 
 velop and extend these principles to 
 meet the requirements of modern life ; 
 that, in fact, he work as nearly as pos- 
 sible in the same direction that the 
 masters of ancient architecture would 
 have done if they had been dealing 
 with modern problems of design, plan, 
 and construction. There are certain 
 immutable laws of harmony and pro- 
 portion which have always governed 
 and will always rule in architecture as 
 in art, and though they are disregard- 
 ed and tampered with for the sake of 
 novelty and so-called originality, this 
 faithlessness always meets its just pun- 
 ishment in the result. The majority of 
 modern architects have, in these days 
 of abundant photographs, models, and 
 measurements, been led to cater to the 
 vanity of half-educated clients, and have 
 engrafted French chateaux on Roman- 
 esque palaces, have invented wonder- 
 fully ingenious but viciously hybrid 
 combinations, one of which has been 
 aptly described as " Queen Anne in 
 front and Mary Ann in the back." The 
 precept and example of the scholarly 
 men in the profession have been power- 
 less to stem this tide of ill-considered 
 design, and nothing short of gradual 
 

 ENGRAVED BY J. W. EVANS. 
 
 Figure Emblematic of the Textile Arts, by Robert Reid, in One of the Domes of the Manufactures Building. 
 
 VOL. XII. 76 
 
694 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 regeneration and slow revulsion of sen- 
 timent against this tendency has been 
 hoped for until the present year. 
 
 Mr. D. H. Burnham, the Director of 
 Works of the World's Columbian Ex- 
 position, took the first important step 
 toward the renaissance of the true spirit 
 
 'Autumn," Panel by G. W. Maynard, in the Agricultural Building. 
 
 of architectui-e in this country by ignor- 
 ing all precedents of competition, and 
 selecting as associates certain archi- 
 tects and firms whose records estab- 
 lished their position as true leaders of 
 the profession. These architects, after 
 studious contemplation of the situation, 
 
 decided on the adoption of a general 
 classical style for the buildings, sub- 
 ject, of course, to such modifications as 
 were found necessary by the require- 
 ments of each individual case. The re- 
 sult is a satisfactory and sufficient proof 
 of the wisdom of Mr. Burnhanr s action, 
 and there is now before the coun- 
 try a more extensive and instruc- 
 tive object-lesson in architecture 
 than has ever been presented to 
 any generation in any country 
 since the most flourishing period 
 of architectural effort. The edu- 
 cational importance of this feat- 
 ure of the great Exposition can 
 scarcely be over - estimated, and 
 its salutary influence on the fut- 
 ure architecture of this country 
 can be prophesied with absolute 
 certainty. The scheme has not 
 been considered complete, how- 
 ever, nor the lesson properly em- 
 phasized, without the necessary 
 adjuncts of the two arts so close- 
 ly allied to architecture, sculpt- 
 ure and painting, both of which 
 have been drawn upon with free- 
 dom and good judgment to sup- 
 plement and enrich the archi- 
 tectural features. Sculpture has 
 been employed far more exten- 
 sively than its sister art, for the 
 very good reason that few of the 
 buildings have been constructed 
 with any intention of carrying 
 the interiors to any high degree 
 of finish. It would have been 
 impracticable, under the circum- 
 stances, to bring the interiors up 
 to the same perfection as the ex- 
 teriors, even with the cheapest 
 material, for it would have added 
 an enormous per cent, to the cost 
 of construction. The architects 
 have, therefore, in most cases 
 frankly accepted the situation 
 and confined their efforts at em- 
 bellishment to the facades, con- 
 sidering the buildings simply as 
 great sketches of possible permanent 
 structures, confessedly utilitarian as to 
 the interior, but as sumptuous and sug- 
 gestive in exterior treatment as the con- 
 ditions permitted. Indeed, this was the 
 only reasonable view to take, both be- 
 cause of the enormous size of the build- 
 
THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 695 
 
 le-work," by J. Alden Weir, in One of the Domes of the Manufactures Building. 
 
 ings and the complex uses for which 
 they are intended. The exhibits them- 
 selves are necessarily such prominent 
 features of the interiors that they only 
 need a background of more or less sim- 
 ple character to complete, with the 
 elaborate installation which is being 
 carried on, quite as agreeable a decora- 
 tion scheme as might be reasonably ex- 
 pected on such an enormous scale. 
 
 Without going into details of con- 
 struction, it is proper to call attention 
 
 to one feature of the interiors, notably 
 of the Machinery and Manufactures 
 and Liberal Arts buildings, where the 
 architect and the engineer have joined 
 forces and produced a result far ahead 
 of anything before accomplished. I re- 
 fer to the wonderfully beautiful iron- 
 work of these buildings, which satisfies 
 to an eminent degree both the utilita- 
 rian and aesthetic requirements. Mr. 
 C. B. Atwood, Designer in Chief, co- 
 operated with Mr. E. C. Shankland, 
 
696 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 Forging," Figure by E. E. Simmons, in the Dome of the East Portal, Manufactures Building, 
 
 Chief Engineer, in working out a plan 
 of construction of the immense trusses 
 with the connecting girders, purlins, 
 and braces, which has been carried out 
 in great perfection. The ugly forms of 
 ordinary bridge builders' construction, 
 which have hitherto been endured as 
 necessary for rigidity and strength, 
 have been largely eliminated, and 
 
 graceful curves, well-balanced propor- 
 tions, and harmonious lines unite to 
 make the iron- work beautiful in itself, 
 a distinctly ornamental feature of the 
 interiors. Thus, without flourish of 
 trumpets, a great advance has been 
 made, and the great truth promulgated 
 that the useful may be beautiful even 
 in engineering. Painting of an artistic 
 
ENGRAVED BV VAN NESS. 
 
 'Ceramic Painting," by Kenyon Cox, in a Dome of the East Portal, Manufactures Building. 
 (From an unfinished sketch.) 
 
698 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 " Pearl," by Walter Shirlaw, in a Dome of the North Portal, Manufactures Building. 
 
 character has been confined for the 
 most part to a few domes and panels in 
 various pavilions, to wall spaces under 
 colonnades and porticos, and to the 
 two or three interiors in Avhich there is 
 sufficiently high finish to permit of mu- 
 ral decoration. 
 
 The Administration Building, by Mr. 
 Richard M. Hunt, which was built for 
 the uses of the World's Columbian Com- 
 
 mission with the numerous branches of 
 its executive force, is the real focus of 
 the group of buildings, not only from 
 its position in the centre of a grand 
 plaza of enormous extent, but on ac- 
 count of its monumental character. 
 The portals and the angles of this build- 
 ing are adorned with groups of sculpt- 
 ure by Mr. Carl Bitter, of New York, 
 and spandrels and panels, both outside 
 
THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 699 
 
 "The Telephone," by J. Carroll Beckwith, In a Dome of the North Portal, Manufactures Building. 
 
 and inside, are enriched by designs by 
 the same sculptor. The dome, which 
 is two hundred and sixty-rive feet high, 
 is truncated at the top and is lighted 
 by a great eye forty feet in diameter. 
 The interior of this dome around the 
 great eye, a surface of the approximate 
 dimensions of 35 x 300 feet, is to be cov- 
 
 ered with a figure composition painted 
 by Mr. W. L. Dodge, representing in 
 general terms the figure of a god on a 
 high Olympian throne crowning with 
 wreaths of laurel the representatives 
 of the arts and sciences, and flanked by 
 figures of Agriculture, Commerce, and 
 Peace. A Greek canopy, supported by 
 
700 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 flying female figures, contrasts agree- 
 ably with the clear blue of the skv 
 background, against which the princi- 
 pal groups are shown in strong relief. 
 Three winged horses drawing a vehicle 
 with a model of the Parthenon, troops 
 of warriors cheering the victors in the 
 peaceful strife of the arts, and a wealth 
 of minor figures, make up the compo- 
 sition, which is bold and imposing not 
 only in magnitude but in line [pp. 705- 
 6-8]. The interior walls of the great 
 Rotunda are tinted so as to give the ef- 
 fects of colored marbles and mosaics, and 
 under the outside the massive white Dor- 
 ic columns have a background of Pom- 
 peian richness of tone. With the excep- 
 tion of Mr. Dodge's composition in the 
 Administration Building, neither of the 
 other buildings fronting on the grand 
 plaza has any purely artistic decora- 
 tion, although the hemicycle and por- 
 tions of the Electricity Building, and 
 the extensive arcades of the Machinery 
 Building, are all treated with flat colors 
 to supplement this architectural orna- 
 ment, the former by Mr. Maitland Arm- 
 strong, the latter by Mr. E. E. Garnsey, 
 of F. J. Sarmiento & Co. Across the 
 south canal, however, a blaze of richly 
 colored panels in the pavilions of the 
 Agricultural Building, with here and 
 there a figure of an animal half hidden by 
 the superb Corinthian columns, shows 
 where Mr. G. W. Maynard and his as- 
 sistant, Mr. H. T. Schladermundt, have 
 converted, by the magic of their art, 
 the uninteresting plaster surfaces into a 
 series of elaborate pictures. This de- 
 coration bas been planned with great at- 
 tention to the appropriate character of 
 its individual features. There are two 
 pavilions at either end of the building, 
 with a large doorway breaking the wall 
 into two panels, each one of which has 
 a dado of elaborate ornament, a narrow 
 border of conventionalized Indian corn 
 on each side, and great garlands of fruit 
 on top framing an oblong rectangle of 
 rich Pompeian red with a colossal fe- 
 male figure of one of the seasons [p. 
 694]. Above the two panels, and con- 
 necting them by a band of color, is a 
 frieze with rearing horses, bulls, oxen 
 drawing a cart of ancient form, and 
 other small groups of agricultural sub- 
 jects. The focus of the decorative 
 
 scheme is naturally at the main portico, 
 the entrance to the Rotunda, called the 
 Temple of Ceres, with the statue of the 
 goddess in the mysterious twilight of 
 the graceful and impressive interior. 
 The portico is treated on much the same 
 plan as the side pavilions, but as it 
 provides a much greater area of wall 
 surface, Mr. Maynard has been able to 
 introduce a richer combination of col- 
 ors and a greater variety of figures. 
 " Abundance " and " Fertility," two co- 
 lossal female figures, occupy, with the 
 richly ornamented borders, great flat 
 niches on either side of the entrance, 
 and are flanked in turn 011 the side-walls 
 by the figure of King Triptolemus, the 
 fabled inventor of the plough, and the 
 goddess Cybele, symbolical of the fer- 
 tility of the earth, the one in a chariot 
 drawn by dragons, the other leading a 
 pair of lions. These figures, as well as 
 those in the four porticos, are treated 
 in a broad, simple manner, so that they 
 carry perfectly to a great distance and 
 at the same time lose nothing by close 
 inspection. 
 
 The sumptuousness of the color dec- 
 oration is balanced by the lavish abun- 
 dance of sculpture work which fills the 
 pediments and crowns the piers and 
 pylons, and, in general terms, the main 
 features of the facades. The main ped- 
 iment is by Mr. Larkiii G. Mead ; and 
 the other statues figures of abundance 
 with cornucopiae, a series of graceful 
 maidens holding signs of the Zodiac, 
 groups of four females representing the 
 quarters of the globe supporting a hor- 
 oscope, and various colossal agricultu- 
 ral animals are all by the hand of Mr. 
 Philip Martiiiy, who joins Mr. Olin L. 
 Warner in supplementing the architect- 
 ural ornamentation of the Art Build- 
 ing with various figures and bas-reliefs. 
 Dominating the grand outlines of the 
 edifice, perched high on the flat dome, 
 is the gilded figure of Diana, by Mr. 
 Augustus St. Gaudens, familiar as the 
 finial of the tower of the Madison 
 Square Garden in New York, a fitting 
 apex of the monumental structure. 
 
 The north front of the Agricultural 
 Building, with the peristyle and the 
 south fayade of the Manufactures and 
 Liberal Arts Building, form a grand 
 court of honor, so to speak, facing the 
 

 
 1 
 
 "Decoration," Figure by C. S. Reinhart. 
 
702 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 Administration Building, which may be 
 appropriately termed the Gateway of 
 the Exhibition, for it rises directly in 
 front of the Terminal Station, a build- 
 ing of vast proportions and noble as- 
 pect, designed to accommodate the 
 thousands of visitors who reach the 
 Fair by the numerous lines of railways 
 concentrated at this point. Six rostral 
 columns, surmounted by a figure of 
 Neptune, by Mr. Johannes Gelert, ac- 
 cent this court at different points. Mr. 
 Frederick MacMonnies's fin-de-siecle 
 colossal fountain fills the west end of 
 the basin with a busy group of symbol- 
 ical figures and a flood of rushing water. 
 Opposite, at the east end of the glitter- 
 ing sheet of water which reflects the 
 architectural glories of the colonnades, 
 the dignified, simple statue of the Re- 
 public, by Mr. D. C. French, towers 
 high in air, relieved against the beau- 
 tiful screen of the Peristyle, with its 
 forest of columns showing clear cut 
 against the blue waters of the lake. 
 Every column and every pier of the 
 Peristyle has its crowning figure, the 
 work of Mr. Theodore Baur, and the 
 great central arch, or Water-Grate sup- 
 ports a colossal Quadriga executed bv 
 Mr. D. C, French and Mr. Edward C. 
 Potter, the former undertaking the fig- 
 ure work, and the latter the horses. 
 Two pair of horses, led by classical fe- 
 male figures, draw a high chariot with 
 a male figure symbolizing the spirit of 
 discovery of the fifteenth century, and 
 pages on horseback flank the chariot on 
 either side, enriching the composition 
 so that it presents a well-sustained mass 
 from every possible point of view. This 
 group is an achievement well worthy 
 of its situation as the dominating em- 
 bellishment of the great court with its 
 wealth of sculpture and ornament. 
 
 The terraces afford another inviting 
 field for open-air decoration. Numer- 
 ous pedestals have tempted the skill of 
 the sculptors of the Quadriga to pro- 
 duce distinguished types of the horse 
 and the bull, and formal antique vases 
 on the balustrade and reproductions 
 of the masterpieces of ancient statu- 
 ary break the long lines of parapet 
 and greensward. The graceful bridges 
 spanning the canals are guarded by 
 sculptured wild animals native of the 
 
 United States, part of them by Mr. Ed- 
 ward Kemeys, others by Mr. A. P. Proc- 
 tor, in appropriate contrast to the clas- 
 sicality of their surroundings and sug- 
 gesting future possibilities in sculpture 
 inspired by similar motives. The eye 
 cannot take in at a glance the sumptu- 
 ous beauties of this grand court, even- 
 in its ragged state of partial finish, but 
 roves from statue to column, portal 
 to terrace, resting agreeably on broad 
 masses of rich color and on the gleam- 
 ing reflections in the basin. Imagina- 
 tion can scarcely picture the scene with 
 the addition of the festal features of 
 fluttering banners, rich awnings, gayly 
 decorated craft giving life and move- 
 ment to the water front, and every- 
 where the crowd of visitors all on recre- 
 ation, bent. 
 
 The casual observer might well be 
 pardoned for failing at first to mark 
 how the grand pavilions and porticos 
 of the Manufactures and Liberal Arts 
 Building are accented by frequent 
 spaces covered with artistic decoration. 
 In each of the four corner pavilions 
 there are two tympana, those on the 
 south side having been given to Mr. 
 Gari Melchers and Mr. Walter Mac- 
 Ewen to fill with a decorative design. 
 Both these artists have made elaborate 
 compositions representing, in general 
 terms, "Music" and "Manufactures" 
 and the " The Arts of Peace," and 
 " The Chase and the Manufacture of 
 Weapons," respectively. 
 
 In the foreground of "Music," at 
 the left, a group of Satyrs pipes to a 
 dancing cluster around the Muse Eu- 
 terpe, and with various other person- 
 ages make up a composition of great 
 distinction of live and skilful arrange- 
 ment. The second panel, which illus- 
 trates manufactures or textiles, is 
 equally rich in groups, and in the back- 
 ground of both compositions is con- 
 tinued a procession in the honor of 
 Pallas Athena, who was credited by the 
 Greeks with the invention of spinning. 
 The general color gamut is light with 
 an intricate harmony of delicate tones. 
 The procession is silhouetted in bluish 
 tones against a warm sky with the col- 
 ors of early evening, the golden reflec- 
 tions touching the figures with beauti- 
 ful lines of light. Mr. Melchers has fol- 
 
ENGRAVED BY J. CLEMENT. 
 
 'The Armorer's Craft," one of four figures by E. H. Blashfield, representing the Arts of Metal Working. 
 
704 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 ft * 
 
 r adopted from the Standard of 
 under Ferdinand and Isabella. 
 
 lowed out much the same general plan of color in a 
 varied but well sustained composition, so that the four 
 tympana make, in a sense, a series of harmonious pict- 
 ures. 
 
 The four grand central portals of the Manufactures 
 and Liberal Arts Building recall triumphant arches of 
 Roman times. Each of these portals has a lofty central 
 entrance with rich bas-reliefs by Mr. Bitter and smaller 
 side arches under pendentive domes. These eight domes 
 have been filled with figure decorations, each by a dif- 
 ferent artist. Those on the south front of the building 
 have been painted by Mr. J. Alden Weir and Mr. Rob- 
 ert Reid, who, with distinctly individual compositions, 
 have harmonized their designs in a remarkably agree- 
 able and skilful manner. Mr. Weir has chosen allegori- 
 cal female figures of "Decorative Art" [p. 695], "The 
 Art of Painting," " Goldsmith's Art," and the " Art of 
 Pottery." Each of these figures is seated on a balustrade 
 and is relieved against a sky of pale broken blue tones. 
 Flying draperies and capitals of four orders of archi- 
 tecture serve to connect the lines of the composition, 
 which is further enriched by a cupid holding a tablet 
 inscribed with the different arts and decorated with a 
 wreath. The figures are large and simple in line, and 
 the general scheme of color is pale blue varied with 
 purple and green, a combination suggested by the evan- 
 escent hues of Lake Michigan. Mr. Reid has also se- 
 lected seated allegorical figures to carry out his ideas, 
 with the addition of four youths, one on the keystone 
 of each arch, holding high above their heads wreaths 
 and palm branches which meet and cross so as to form 
 a band of decorative forms around the upper part of 
 the dome. A semi-nude figure of a man with an anvil 
 and wrought-iron shield represents " Iron working ; " a 
 young girl in white resting one arm on a pedestal and 
 the hand of the other arm touching a piece of carved 
 stone, signifies " Ornament ; " another in purple, finish- 
 ing a drawing of a scroll, suggests the principle of 
 " Design," as applied to mechanical arts, and the fourth 
 figure is readily interpreted as honoring the "Textile 
 Arts " [p. 693]. In the east portal Mr. E. E. Simmons has 
 placed a single figure of a man in each pendentive of the 
 dome, symbolizing " Wood Carving," " Stone Cutting," 
 "Forging" [p. 696], and "Mechanical Appliances." The 
 general scheme is pale gray and flesh-colored tones re- 
 lieved and accentuated by the forms of the tools and ac- 
 cessories appropriate to each figure. The composition 
 is bold in line, firm in outline, and original in conception. 
 Mr. Kenyon Cox in the adjacent dome has worked so 
 far in harmony with Mr. Simmons that he has decorated 
 the pendentives rather than the upper part of the vault, 
 placing a standing female figure in each against a bal- 
 ustrade and foliage. Above the heads, graceful bande- 
 roles, bearing the subjects illustrated, convert each pen- 
 dentive into a shield-shaped space. A robust woman in 
 buff jacket testing a sword, suggests " Steel Working." 
 A graceful girl in blue and white drapery holding a rare 
 
THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 705 
 
 vase needs no title to show that she rep- 
 resents "Ceramic Painting" [p. 697]. 
 " Building " is symbolized by a tall 
 and shapely damsel in golden 
 green robes, standing near an 
 uncompleted wall, and " Spin- 
 ning " by a stately maiden of 
 fair complexion dressed in 
 rose-colored stuffs, with the 
 significant accessory of a spi- 
 der web. In the north por- 
 tal Mr. J. Carroll Beckwith 
 has illustrated the subject of 
 Electricity as applied to Com- 
 merce. Four female figures 
 occupy the pendentives. The 
 " Telephone " and the " Indi- 
 cator " are personified by a 
 woman standing holding a 
 telephone to her ear and sur- 
 rounded by tape issuing from 
 the ticker [p. 699] ; " The 
 Arc Light " by a figure kneel- 
 ing holding aloft an arc light ; 
 " The Morse Telegraph " by 
 a woman in flying draperies 
 seated at a table upon which 
 is the operating machine, 
 while she reads from a book ; 
 and "The Dynamo" by a 
 woman of a type of the 
 working - class seated upon 
 the magnet with a revolving 
 wheel and belt at her feet. 
 Above, in the upper dome, is 
 placed the "Spirit of Electric- 
 ity," a figure of a boy at the 
 top of the dome from which 
 radiate rays of lightning, to 
 Avhich he points. Mr. Walter 
 Shirlaw, who has decorated 
 the neighboring dome, shows distinct 
 originality of conception in his four al- 
 legorical figures, " Gold" [p. 698], "Sil- 
 ver," "Pearl," and "Coral," symbolizing 
 the abundance of the land and the sea. 
 The maiden representing "Gold" steps 
 forward freely, her mantle of yellow fall- 
 ing as she advances. A silver- gray cloak, 
 fastened with silver disks, distinguishes 
 the figure of " Silver." " Pearl " stands 
 erect with glistening pearls around her 
 neck and on her garments. " Coral," 
 with raised arms, places a coral orna- 
 ment in her hair. A spider's web in dec- 
 orative pattern connects the figures and 
 occupies the central surface of the dome. 
 
 White, green, and gold, treated in mon- 
 otones, form the color plan. 
 
 The figure on page 701 is taken from 
 
 Musicians," Fragment from the Procession, by W. L. Dodge, 
 Dome of the Administration Building. 
 
 a sketch of one of Mr. C. S. Reinhart's 
 figures in the south dome of the West 
 Portal, and has been materially changed 
 in the enlargement, and improved in ac- 
 tion and accessories. The effort of the 
 artist has been to bring all the separate 
 tones into harmony with each other, 
 making the design and color appropri- 
 ate to the purposes of the building, the 
 architecture, and the construction of 
 the pendentive dome itself. A white- 
 marble terrace describes a complete cir- 
 cle just above the four arches of the 
 dome, the railing of which is a repetition 
 of the actual one which finishes the top 
 of the walls of the building itself ; above 
 
706 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 a vibrating blue sky, with touches of 
 salmon pink ; in the pendentives four 
 seated female figures, representing the 
 
 by a helmeted figure ; the "Brass 
 Founder" and "Iron Worker" by two 
 half-nude youths, one holding an em- 
 bossed trencher, the 
 other a hammer, while 
 a maiden, in the close- 
 ly clinging gown of 
 the fifteenth century, 
 with a statuette in her 
 hand, symbolizes the 
 "Art of the Gold- 
 smith." The extreme 
 points of the penden- 
 tives are filled by ap- 
 propriate attributes, a 
 pair of gauntlets, brass 
 workers' tools, a horse- 
 shoe, and a medal. 
 Behind the figures, and 
 a little above their 
 heads, is a frieze of Re- 
 naissance scroll work, 
 and the whole compo- 
 sition is bound togeth- 
 er by flying banderoles 
 and by the sweep of 
 the widely extended 
 wings. The centre of 
 the dome is occupied 
 by two winged infants 
 supporting a shield. 
 The general color 
 scheme comprises a se- 
 ries of peacock blues, 
 greens, and purples, 
 brilliant white tones in 
 wings and frieze, and 
 pale blue of the sky as 
 a background to the 
 
 Female Figure from W. L. Dodge's Decoration in the Administration Building. 
 
 Arts of Sculpture, Decoration, Em- 
 broidery, and Design. Between the fig- 
 ures and above the arches are urns with 
 cactus, from which vines and flowers 
 are trailing, thus uniting the composi- 
 tion. The treatment is mural broad, 
 flat tones within the severe contours. 
 Above, in the sky, faint in color and 
 harmonizing with the sky itself, four 
 cherubs are having a merry-go-round 
 with pale ribbons. 
 
 The pendentives of the adjacent dome, 
 painted by Mr. E. H. Blashfield, are filled 
 by four winged genii, representing the 
 "Arts of Metal Working." The "Ar- 
 morer's Craft " [p. 703] is personified 
 
 composition. 
 
 The list of figure 
 decorations briefly described above in- 
 cludes, with the exception of those in 
 the Woman's Building, by Miss Mary 
 Cassatt and Mrs. Frederick MacMon- 
 nies, all the work of this special artistic 
 nature which has, at present writing, 
 been decided upon ; but there is every 
 reason to hope that the panels in the 
 Art Building may receive some adorn- 
 ment worthy of the noble structure, 
 that the frieze around the dome of the 
 Horticultural Building may also be ar- 
 tistically treated, that the Music Hall 
 of the Peristyle may have various wall- 
 spaces decorated with figure work, and 
 that the scheme laid out for the Manu- 
 
THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 factures and Liberal Arts Building- may be completed 
 by the painting of the four remaining tympana in the 
 corner pavilions on the north end. 
 
 The sculpture groups on the roof of the Woman's 
 Building, and the elaborate pediments executed by 
 Miss Alice Hideout, Avith the Caryatides, by Miss Enid 
 Yandell, have already long been in place. The same is 
 true of Lorado Taft's graceful groups and friezes which 
 adorn the Horticultural Building, and of Mr. John J. 
 Boyle's realistic and expressive embodiments of ideas 
 suggested by the fertile theme of Transportation, and 
 ranged in almost bewildering profusion around the 
 building which bears that name. The much-desired 
 statue of Columbus, probably to be executed under 
 the direction of Mr. St. Gaudens, the regiment of stat- 
 ues on the Machinery Building, by Mr. M. A. Waagen 
 and Mr. Robert Kraus, those on the Electricity Build- 
 ing, by Mr. J. A. Blankingship and Mr. Henry A. Mac- 
 Neil, the statue of Franklin, by Mr. Carl Rom-Smith, 
 together with scores of other works of more or less 
 importance, would, if listed, make a long catalogue of 
 interesting objects of the sculptor's art. The immense 
 numbers of these works, proportionate, of course, to 
 the colossal magnitude of the Exposition, forbid even 
 the bare mention of them in detail. In addition to j 
 
 this great mass of sculpture work executed for the spe- ' 
 
 cial purpose of supplementing the architecture, it is in- 
 tended to place at different places, notably in the Grand 
 Court and on the grounds, and in the colonnades of the 
 Art Building, selected examples of ancient sculpture, 
 various reproductions of antique monuments, and prob- 
 ably also a certain number of works offered for exhibi- 
 tion. 
 
 An essential part of the decoration of the building 
 is, of course, the architectural details, the models of 
 which have been executed by various parties, notably 
 Ellin & Kitson, of New York, and Evans, of Boston, 
 with distinguished taste and skill. The capitals, mould- 
 ings, and ornaments of Greek and Roman buildings 
 have been accurately copied on a scale and in a man- 
 ner never before attempted. A few short months ago 
 there was in this country but a very limited number 
 of full-sized reproductions of any of the notable de- 
 tails of ancient architecture. The cast of the great 
 Jupiter Stator capital was, it is said, found in but a 
 single architect's office. Now the whole range of de- 
 tails, from the beautiful Ionic capitals of the Temple 
 of Minerva Polias to the mouldings of the Arch of 
 Tittis, are practically at the command of any architect 
 and student. 
 
 Much has been said and much written about the 
 proper color to be giA r en to the exteriors of the great 
 edinces. Experience shows, even if reason had not 
 already dictated the decision, that the nearer they are 
 kept to white the better for the architecture. Every 
 experiment which has been made to produce aesthetic 'at/: 
 effects of texture suggested by the usual treatment of 
 
 707 
 
 Banner adopted from the Expedi 
 ary Flag of Columbus. 
 
708 
 
 THE DECORATION OF THE EXPOSITION. 
 
 Riders of Winged Horses, from W. L. Dodge's Decoration in the Administration Building. 
 
 plaster objects lias resulted in partial 
 or in total failure, and every time the 
 warm white of the staff has been med- 
 dled with, its glory has departed. But 
 the conditions imposed by the climate, 
 by the impossibility of securing a ho- 
 mogeneous surface, and by the expos- 
 ure and consequent discoloration of a 
 certain portion of the work have made 
 it necessary to apply some sort of paint 
 to all the buildings. Ordinary white- 
 lead and oil have been found to give the 
 best results, for the irregular absorp- 
 tion of the staff and the weathering 
 rapidly produce an agreeable, not too 
 monotonous an effect, and the surface 
 deteriorates less rapidly after this treat- 
 ment. The single notable exception to 
 this simple scale of color is found on 
 the Transportation Building, which has 
 been given to Healy and Millet, of Chi- 
 cago, to cover with a polychromatic dec- 
 oration, carrying out the original inten- 
 tion of the architects, and making it 
 unique and splendid in appearance. 
 All the statuary of this building is to be 
 treated with bronze and other metals, 
 the great portal, commonly called the 
 "Golden Door," will be exceedingly rich 
 and gorgeous in effect, and the intricate 
 
 ornamentation of the architectural relief 
 decoration Avill have an echo in the flat 
 surfaces covered with rich designs. 
 
 The decoration of the Exposition 
 would be incomplete without careful 
 attention to the informal and festive 
 features, such as flags and awnings. 
 Every building presents new conditions 
 and demands special study and design. 
 A large proportion of the flag -staffs 
 will bear gonfalons or banners, but a 
 certain number will be reserved, natur- 
 ally, for the United States flag and the 
 flags of all nations. At various points 
 large poles will be planted in the 
 ground, most of them for the purpose 
 of displaying the Stars and Stripes, and 
 a group of three poles, with ornate 
 bases, elaborate flutings, and proper 
 finials will be placed in front of the 
 Administration Building. The middle 
 pole will carry a United States flag of 
 large dimensions, and it will be flanked 
 on either side by a large and sumptu- 
 ous banner, one adapted from the expe- 
 ditionary banner of Columbus [p. 707], 
 the other from the standard of Spain 
 [p. 704] at the time of the discovery of 
 America. The finishing touches of the 
 Exposition can only be given after the 
 
A WEST INDIAN SLAl^E INSURRECTION. 
 
 709 
 
 storms of winter are over and the spring 
 fairly sets in, and on the perfection of 
 the finish will depend a great part of the 
 charm of the place to the visitor and 
 to the exhibitor. It was recorded in 
 the first pages of this article that lit- 
 tle could be expected of the interiors 
 to compare with the elaboration of the 
 fayades. But the white -wash brush 
 which converts the interior of a hovel 
 into an attractive dwelling can also 
 metamorphose the rough timber-work 
 into a near semblance of finished con- 
 struction and give the great naves and 
 
 aisles a tidy and agreeable aspect. As 
 far as this work has already proceeded 
 it has surpassed the expectations of all 
 concerned. A few simple tints, selected 
 with care, give the best results and 
 form a most satisfactory background 
 for the installation of exhibits. 
 
 In the enormous perspectives ordi- 
 nary means of decoration with bunting 
 and banners fail entirely, for they are 
 annihilated by the colossal size of the 
 surroundings. Therefore the problem 
 is a new one, and the future will show 
 whether it can be satisfactorily solved. 
 
 A WEST INDIAN SLAVE INSURRECTION. 
 
 By George W. Cable. 
 
 L STAGE AND ACTORS. 
 
 'HIS is a time story. But it 
 is not mine ; I take it all 
 from a friend's manuscript, 
 which I have had for years 
 and which lies before me 
 now. It tells of a beautiful 
 island lying some twelve 
 hundred miles southeast- 
 ward from the southern end of Florida ; 
 the largest of the Virgin group ; the isl- 
 and of the Holy Cross. Columbus, on 
 his second voyage of American discov- 
 ery, sailing into the marvellous waters 
 of the Caribbean sea, found this won- 
 derful island. Its inhabitants called it 
 Aye-Aye ; but he piously changed its 
 title to Santa Cruz, and bore away a 
 number of its people to Spain as slaves, 
 to show them what Christians looked 
 like in quantity, and how they behaved 
 to one another and to strangers. You 
 can hear more about Santa Cruz from 
 anybody in the rum business. 
 
 It has had many owners. As with 
 the woman of numerous husbands, in 
 the Sadducee's riddle, seven political 
 powers have had this mermaid as bride. 
 Spain, the English, the Dutch, the Span- 
 iards again, the French, the Knights of 
 Malta, the French again, who sold her to 
 the Guinea Company, who in 1734 trans- 
 ferred her to the Danes, from whom the 
 English captured her in 1807, but re- 
 stored her again at the close of Napo- 
 leon's wars, in 1815. Thus, at last, Den- 
 VOL. XII. 77 
 
 mark prevailed as the ruling power ; 
 but the English language remained the 
 speech of the people. The two towns of 
 the island are Christiansted on the north 
 and Fredericksted on the south. It is 
 about twenty-three miles long and six 
 miles wide. Christiansted is the capital 
 
 In 1848 there lived on Kongensgade, 
 that is King Street, in Frekericksted, a lit- 
 tle maiden named Dora. I have known 
 her these many years, though I did not 
 know her as a child or in the island. She 
 is the author of the manuscript now ly- 
 ing before me, from the facts of which I 
 shah 1 not go aside from first to last, even 
 though I have to end the story tamely 
 without births, deaths, or marriages. 
 
 She dwelt with her aunts, Marion, 
 Anna, and Marcia, and her grandmother, 
 and was just old enough to begin taking 
 care of her dignity. I wish the story 
 were even more about her than it is. 
 Whether she was Danish, British, or 
 United Statesish, she was often puz- 
 zled to know. When her grandmother, 
 whose husband had belonged to a family 
 which had furnished a signer of our 
 Declaration, told her stories of the 
 American Revolution, Dora felt the glow 
 of an American patriotism. But her 
 grandmother had stories of English 
 valor and renown as well, and when in 
 telling these she warmed up to their 
 heroic or momentous nature, she would 
 remind Dora that her, the damsel's, 
 father and mother were born on this 
 island under British sway, and "once 
 
710 
 
 A WEST INDIAN SLAYE INSURRECTION. 
 
 a Briton always a Briton." And yet 
 again, Dora's playmates would say 
 
 " But you, yourself, were born when 
 the island was already Danish ; you are 
 a subject of King Christian VHL" 
 
 One of her playmates, much beloved 
 of her, was invariably silent on this sub- 
 ject. He was a large and beautiful 
 white cat, much more important to 
 Dora than he is to this story, in which 
 he appears but once, momentarily and 
 quite parenthetically. 
 
 Kongensgade, though narrow, was 
 one of the main streets that ran from 
 the walls of an estate at the northeast- 
 ern end of the town, to the lagoon and 
 fort at the southwestern end. Dora's 
 home was a long, low cottage on the 
 street's southern side, its rear facing 
 southward, seaward, on grounds that 
 sloped downward to the street in front 
 and rose and widened out extensively 
 at the back, until they suddenly fell 
 away in bluffs to the beach. It had been 
 built for the grandmother, a bridal gift 
 from her rich husband. But now in her 
 widowhood the wealth was gone, and 
 only refinement and inspiring traditions 
 remained. 
 
 At her husband's death the estate left 
 her was mainly slaves, whose sale or hire 
 might have kept her in comfort. But 
 a clergyman lately come from England 
 convinced her that no Christian should 
 hold a slave, and setting them free, she 
 accepted a life of self-help and of no 
 little privation. She was his only con- 
 vert ; his own zeal soon quieted ; and 
 there being no adequate public freedom 
 provided either by law or custom for 
 those whom private hands and con- 
 sciences liberated, her ex-slaves merely 
 hired their labor to less scrupulous em- 
 ployers, and yearly grew more worthless 
 to themselves and the community. 
 
 Yet, to be poor on that island did not, 
 of necessity, mean a sordid narrowing 
 of life. The voices of nature were lofty, 
 the beauties of land and sea were in- 
 spiring. You would have found the 
 main room of Dora's home furnished in 
 mahogany black with age and mounted 
 with brass. In a corner where the 
 breezes came in by a great window, 
 stood a jar big enough to have held one 
 of Ali Baba's thieves, into which trickled 
 with a cool gurgle a thread of water 
 
 from a huge dripping-stone set in a 
 frame, while above these a shelf held 
 native waterpots whose yellow and crim- 
 son surfaces were constantly pearled 
 with dew evaporating through the po- 
 rous clay. On a low mahogany press 
 near by was piled the remnant of the 
 father's library ; and there were silver 
 snuffers, candlesticks, crystal shades, 
 and such like on the ancient sideboard. 
 
 But it was not old mahogany, brass, 
 silver, or family traditions that gave this 
 room its finest charm. As you entered 
 it from the street the glory of the sea 
 met you and filled the place. There 
 was no need, no whereabouts, for pict- 
 ures. The living portraits of nature 
 hung framed in wide high windows 
 through which came in the distant 
 boom of the surf on the rocks, and its 
 salt breath perfumed with the blossoms 
 of the cassia. A broad door led from it 
 by a flight of stone steps to the couch- 
 like roots of a gigantic turpentine tree 
 whose deep shade gave harbor to birds 
 of every hue. It was these things that 
 lent the room such beauty that even 
 strangers, entering it, exclaimed aloud 
 in admiration. 
 
 And outside, round about, there was 
 far more. To Dora, sitting often by that 
 equatorial sea, the island's old Carib 
 name of Aye -Aye seemed the eternal 
 consent of God to some seraphic spirit 
 asking for this ocean pearl. All that 
 poet or prophet had ever said of heaven 
 became comprehensible in its daily trans- 
 figurations of light and color scintillated 
 between wave, landscape, and cloud, its 
 sea like unto crystal, and the trees bear- 
 ing all manner of fruits. Fragrance, 
 light, form, color, everywhere ; fruits 
 crimson, gold, and purple ; fishes blue, 
 orange, pink ; shells of rose and pearl. 
 Distant hills, clouds of sunset and dawn, 
 sky and stream, leaf and flower, bird and 
 butterfly, repeated the splendor, while 
 round about all palpitated the wooing 
 rhythm of the sea's mysterious tides. 
 
 The beach ! Along its landward edge 
 the plumed palms stood sentinel, min- 
 gling their faint rustle with the lipping 
 of the waters and the curious note of the 
 Thibet-trees that shook their long dry 
 pods like castanets in the evening breeze. 
 By the water's margin what treasures of 
 the under world ! Here a sponge, with 
 
CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 By Franklin MacVeagh. 
 
 T will aid the editor of 
 SCBIBNER'S, who wishes to 
 inform the readers of the 
 MAGAZINE as to the rela- 
 tions of Chicago and the 
 great Exposition, if I state 
 that this article is written 
 at his suggestion by one 
 who has no connection 
 with the World's Fair 
 management ; because then it need not 
 be read as if it were the doing of an 
 enthusiast. The truth, however, is that 
 it is much easier to keep within the 
 facts, in this case, than it is to get be- 
 yond them, if one has only the usual 
 imagination ; and the editor in try- 
 ing to get an unbiassed article might 
 have saved himself some of his trouble. 
 Moreover, there is probably nothing new 
 to be said at all, which is another pro- 
 tection against enthusiasm ; for every- 
 thing touching Chicago's relations to 
 the Fair has probably been said many 
 times over both as to her part in mak- 
 ing the Fair, and as to how she will care 
 for the people who visit it. But the 
 facts have not been put all together, nor 
 for the general public, in any more de- 
 liberate form than news items of the 
 daily press. 
 
 In measuring the discharge of respon- 
 sibilities by Chicago one should be care- 
 ful to know what her responsibilities 
 are. She has practically taken the work 
 of the Fair upon her hands entire, even, 
 in large measure carrying on her shoul- 
 ders the Government's own Commission. 
 But strict limitations to the responsi- 
 bilities of whatever city might be chosen 
 as the place of the Fair, were clearly 
 fixed by the Government. The theory of 
 the law was that the World's Fair should 
 be controlled and administered by the 
 Government's Commission ; while the city 
 was simply to furnish, to the satisfaction 
 of the Commission, a site and buildings, 
 and then to conduct the mere business 
 administration. The scope of the Fair, 
 and all intercourse with exhibitors and 
 with foreign nations, and all matters of 
 
 award and the general control, were to 
 be in the hands of the Government. To 
 carry out the engagements of Chicago a 
 corporation was formed, the members 
 of which are the shareholders, who fairly 
 represent the entire community, and 
 whose work is done by a board of forty- 
 five directors. There are therefore two 
 executive bodies, admirably contrived 
 for conflicts of authority and general 
 confusion and delay ; all of which prom- 
 ised at the beginning, but have been 
 for the most part averted by the uncon- 
 templated dependence of the National 
 Commission and its admirable good 
 sense and patriotism, and by the youth- 
 ful readiness of Chicago to do unlimited 
 work and assume unlimited responsibil- 
 ities. Perhaps any other American city 
 would have done this, and felt obliged, 
 by the Government's reluctance, to pay 
 the way of its Commission, to discharge 
 its own responsibilities and those of the 
 Government, too. Chicago, at any rate, 
 accepted very willingly the work which 
 threw upon her an almost exclusive re- 
 sponsibility for the success of the Fair. 
 And it has certainly had the excellent 
 effect of unifying the management, by 
 breaking down in practice the double 
 authority fixed by the law. Since the 
 Government would not adequately sup- 
 port it, the Commission had to look to 
 the Directory for a part of its subsist- 
 ence ; and as in all governments the real 
 power goes with the purse-strings, so it 
 was in this. Possibly the power might 
 have resided in the National Commission, 
 if Congress had generously sustained it ; 
 and yet, looking back now, it is diffi- 
 cult to imagine the absence of the pro- 
 foundly individual impress made upon 
 the Fair by the characteristics of the 
 city ; nor does it seem possible that the 
 remarkable power, energy, and public 
 spirit which were so ready to devote 
 themselves could have been declined. 
 At any rate in this way, and in this alone, 
 by indefinitely exceeding Chicago's re- 
 sponsibilities, has the World's Fair se- 
 cured the advantage of the astonishing 
 
552 
 
 CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 individuality of the city. And so favor- 
 ably has the world been impressed that 
 it is doubtful whether Congress, when it 
 makes an appropriation, will now dis- 
 turb the situation. 
 
 But there is another thing to be said 
 of Chicago's responsibilities. It is gen- 
 erally assumed that the Fair is Chicago's 
 enterprise, and only countenanced by 
 the Government ; for it is forgotten that 
 Congress, feeling obliged to celebrate 
 the four hundredth anniversary of the 
 discovery of America, chose to hold a 
 World's Fair, and established it before 
 deciding where it should be held. There 
 was after this a sharp contest in Con- 
 gress between the partisans of four cities. 
 This is a different thing, and carries 
 very different responsibilities from a 
 proposal by Chicago to hold a fair on 
 its own account, coupled with a request 
 for the Government's endorsement. As 
 I have intimated, Chicago hasn't troubled 
 itself to draw lines about its responsi- 
 bilities, and it has been prompt to fill all 
 the gaps left by the Government ; but if 
 we are to weigh the performance of her 
 duties we must understand what her 
 duties are. 
 
 And here, before going on to specify 
 what has been done by Chicago, and 
 what will be done, let me say a word 
 about the finances. I am writing before 
 it is possible to know what action Con- 
 gress will take ; but I have no doubt 
 whatever that, whether Congress contri- 
 butes or not, the Fair will not be allowed 
 to fail, or even to suffer. Chicago is 
 committed, not to the world for her re- 
 sponsibilities there are distinctly limited 
 but to herself ; and under whatever 
 hardship or injustice, she will unques- 
 tionably raise all the money needed if 
 the Government refuses to participate.* 
 No one who understands Chicago could 
 doubt this for a moment ; and if Con- 
 gress declines the responsibility it will 
 be because she knows Chicago will as- 
 sume it. 
 
 Nothing, however, in my opinion, 
 could be a more unjust hardship. 
 What are the facts ? 
 
 1. That the sum put in the bill for 
 the city to contribute was five millions. 
 
 2. That no higher sum was men- 
 
 * This paper had been written before the final action 
 of Congress. 
 
 tioned while the contest of the cities was 
 before Congress. 
 
 3. That the deliberate judgment of 
 Congress and of the contesting cities, at 
 the time Chicago was chosen, was that 
 five millions measured all a city should 
 contribute in addition to a site. 
 
 4. That the bill had practically passed, 
 and simply paused in the hands of a 
 committee while the city was chosen, 
 that the name might be inserted ; and 
 at this juncture, and when Chicago had 
 been chosen, one of the unsuccessful 
 cities chose to say it would have pro- 
 vided ten millions, whereupon the com- 
 mittee chose to think Chicago ought to 
 double the amount which Congress had 
 itself adopted. Three Chicago men went 
 before the committee to meet this situa- 
 tion. They thought it would not do to 
 stand upon their rights, and yielded to 
 the pressure. They telegraphed the 
 fact, and received in reply a telegram 
 from leading Chicago financial institu- 
 tions and wealthy citizens, sustaining 
 them. Perhaps the committee ought to 
 have insisted upon the amount in the bill 
 when the cities contested, and which 
 was part of a moral contract ; but they 
 did not, and Chicago, which had not en- 
 tered a ten-million contest, found itself 
 with its obligations suddenly doubled 
 doubled in a day never having before 
 contemplated such a thing. 
 
 5. That the committee of Congress 
 itself faltered, fearing Chicago might 
 be promising under pressure more than 
 it could perform. It therefore cross- 
 examined Mr. Gage, the Chicago spokes- 
 man, as to how Chicago could get the 
 other five millions of dollars. Mr. Gage 
 made the best answers he could, the 
 new situation being wholly unexpected. 
 He said, " We will raise another million 
 by subscription, and then we will 
 pledge the gate receipts and borrow the 
 other four from our people. We will 
 get it somehow, for we have promised." 
 
 6. That as five millions was consid- 
 ered sufficient, no one ever expected that 
 Chicago ought to exceed ten. 
 
 7. That Chicago has voluntarily raised 
 the sum to eleven millions, and herself 
 proposes to raise it to thirteen. 
 
 8. That meanwhile the National Com- 
 mission, which had to be made satisfied 
 with site and buildings, and determined 
 
CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 653 
 
 the scope of the exhibits, demanded so 
 much that eighteen millions will be 
 needed to open the Fair. These de- 
 mands were wise and were heartily be- 
 lieved in by Chicago ; but the Govern- 
 ment took the responsibility of making 
 them. 
 
 9. That Congress has itself pro- 
 nounced that Chicago has already ful- 
 filled its financial obligation to the Fair, 
 leaving, one might think, nothing to be 
 said. 
 
 It is true that Chicago was expected 
 to furnish the site and buildings, but 
 certainly not at a cost of eighteen mil- 
 lions. If Congress refuse to share the 
 wholly unexpected increased expense 
 of her own enterprise, Chicago will 
 beyond any question pay it all. But 
 would it be worthy of the nation to 
 take advantage of a clause in the bill 
 originally associated with a liability of 
 five millions of dollars, and already 
 obliged to include a liability of double 
 the original amount, to make a single 
 city pay eighteen millions in face of the 
 fact that the increased cost has been in- 
 curred by the Government itself and 
 when Congress has formally enacted 
 that Chicago has fulfilled its obliga- 
 tions ? 
 
 And these financial relations have 
 worked from the beginning other mis- 
 chief, and have made Congress not sim- 
 ply parsimonious, but unfriendly and 
 unjust as well No one certainly can 
 deny that it is unfriendly and unjust to 
 enact a great World's Fair and select 
 a city to hold it in, throw the whole 
 expense and responsibility upon that 
 city, and then treat the whole affair 
 with practical hostility. And that has 
 occurred ; and Chicago, in addition to 
 lacking the support of certain influen- 
 tial parts of our country, and those the 
 parts most known and listened to by 
 foreign nations, has had to carry the 
 weight of governmental suspicion, hesi- 
 tation, and indifference. The only thing 
 volunteered by Congress has been an 
 investigation, and its only anxiety has 
 been to escape expense. 
 
 And under these not too easy or flat- 
 tering circumstances, what, speaking now 
 specifically, has our youngest American 
 city done ? That it has done wonders 
 all the world now knows ; and in this 
 
 we may all take pleasure, for it is a 
 national achievement due to national 
 traits in their most national develop- 
 ment. 
 
 In the first place, then, Chicago, ex- 
 pecting at first to furnish five millions 
 of dollars, has supplied eleven millions, 
 and will certainly supply two millions 
 more ; and the other five, if the Govern- 
 ment doesn't. 
 
 She has also arranged a site for the 
 Fair which in extent, in situation, in 
 plan, and in adornment, exceeds by far 
 anything ever before attempted for 
 World's Fair purposes. 
 
 She has provided these remarkable 
 grounds with buildings equally remark- 
 able ; which in size, variety (within the 
 wonderful harmony of a general plan), 
 and artistic value, constitute the greatest 
 possible aid to the development of na- 
 tional architecture, and suggest the sin- 
 gle regret that they are not to remain 
 always, to interest and instruct the na- 
 tion. 
 
 She has brought sculpture and kin- 
 dred forms of adornment into -generous 
 use to make the buildings more worthy, 
 more interesting, and more beautiful ; 
 and has given to sculpture other wide 
 and distinguished opportunities. 
 
 She has brought color to its most ar- 
 tistic and refined exterior uses, and pro- 
 tected and defined it to a single large 
 result ; so that nothing in the hundreds 
 of acres is too large or too small 
 neither a building nor a boat to be 
 brought into a general harmony. 
 
 These great effects have been made 
 possible by seeking them with single- 
 ness of purpose and largeness of mind. 
 In the first place, politics had to be vig- 
 orously excluded ; and their complete 
 exclusion and the substitution of pure 
 public spirit in their stead, is one of 
 the remarkable feats of this enterprise. 
 The expenditure of eighteen millions of 
 public money within two years, in an 
 American city, without wasting a penny 
 through politics, and without letting a 
 politician ply his trade for one moment, 
 is a unique achievement, and a very im- 
 portant contribution to American his- 
 tory. 
 
 To achieve these great effects, another 
 rigorous exclusion had to be made, and 
 was made almost or quite by instinct 
 
554 
 
 CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 the exclusion of localism. From the 
 first the directors simply sought out 
 the best things and the ablest men, re- 
 gardless of where they came from. The 
 architecture, for instance, is by picked 
 men whom all would say represent the 
 best development of that art throughout 
 the United States. The color directors 
 come, one from the West and one from, 
 the East. The chief landscape archi- 
 tect is Frederick Law Olmstead, the re- 
 cognized head of his profession. So in 
 all things else a perfect cosmopolitan- 
 ism has prevailed. 
 
 But more than this, none but the 
 largest and noblest plans and the best 
 ideas have been adopted from the be- 
 ginning until now. Nothing is inade- 
 quate, nothing without great plan, noth- 
 ing incomplete, and nothing inharmoni- 
 ous ; and nothing falls short of " the 
 best that is thought and known in the 
 world." There is no note of provincial- 
 ism and of localism : all has been ex- 
 cluded but the evidence of unique public 
 spirit, wonderful energy, and the better 
 knowledge of the world. 
 
 Another achievement is now assured 
 in the certain completion of site and 
 buildings within the time specified. 
 
 And another doubt has been resolved 
 by the unprecedented foreign interest 
 in the Fair. The international char- 
 acter of the enterprise will be more ac- 
 cented than that of any previous exposi- 
 tion. The number of foreign countries 
 exhibiting will be not less than fifty- 
 nine, and in many an exceeding interest 
 is felt. What seemed the impossible 
 has been rather easily accomplished ; and 
 it now seems as if we had been over- 
 looking the special reasons why both ex- 
 hibitors and visitors and governments 
 should prefer to get into the midst of a 
 nation rather than to merely reach its 
 coast. Indeed, the justification of the 
 location of the Fair in the interior is 
 now seen to be complete ; for not only 
 will foreign exhibitors have access to all 
 of our people, and all foreigners who 
 come see a much greater portion of our 
 country, but our own people will better 
 see our own country and get better ac- 
 quainted with each other. 
 
 But, after all, the best thing that Chi- 
 cago can boast of is that she is building 
 a Fair that can conveniently be visited 
 
 by more of the American people who are 
 not rich than could visit it in any other 
 city. This is her finest justification ; 
 and we may be sure she has done this 
 great work with this inspiring thought 
 in her mind. And it can truly be add- 
 ed that, as she has been building for the 
 people, and as politics and mere localism 
 have been excluded, so nothing that is 
 petty or sordid, or any other way un- 
 worthy in motive, has been admitted 
 within her plans. She could not have 
 built as she has with sordid motives or 
 a narrow mind. The building of the 
 Fair could not be given over, as it 
 wholly is, to the spirit of art and beau- 
 ty, and high and wide usefulness, if the 
 men who direct it or the community 
 supporting them felt it to be other than 
 a great public trust, committed to hands 
 that must be kept clean and to minds 
 that must be kept clear. It is right 
 that this should be said, for it is a part 
 of the evidence of how Chicago has dis- 
 charged her responsibilities, and of how 
 she has dealt with the honor of the na- 
 tion. 
 
 And so, not by magic but through 
 well-considered purpose, hard thought, 
 and hard work Chicago, in acknowledg- 
 ment of her responsibilities, presents 
 a World's Fair site and buildings that 
 not only surpass what has been done 
 by previous World's Fairs, but equally 
 surpass the expectations of the nation ; 
 and at the same time give guarantee 
 that the Exposition will be filled to over- 
 flowing with the exhibits of almost the 
 entire world. The outside alone will be 
 enough for any man to see ; and the in- 
 side will certainly excel that of any 
 other exhibition. Even the more purely 
 intellectual and spiritual sides of exhi- 
 bitions, contrary to general expectation, 
 will be here more than ever accented ; 
 and there has again been done what 
 was thought to be impossible, in plac- 
 ing it beyond question that the Fine 
 Arts department will be one of the great- 
 est successes of the Fair. And though 
 the Fair has from the. beginning been 
 treated as a vast educational enterprise, 
 the other important end, of making it 
 an entertainment upon a vast scale, has 
 been completely secured. Orchestral 
 and choral music will be beyond doubt 
 at their best ; and amusements and nov- 
 
CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 555 
 
 elties will be in such increased numbers 
 over those of other expositions, and of 
 so much greater elaboration, and will 
 occupy so much more space, that they 
 will constitute a new development. And 
 great preparation and provision has been 
 made for congresses of every useful kind ; 
 and for the accommodation of these the 
 new Art Institute, now building by day 
 and night in the centre of the city, will 
 be entirely set aside. All these are pro- 
 vided, or all fully assured ; and are noted 
 here as chief instances only among the 
 things which Chicago has thus far done 
 in fulfilment of her legal obligations, and 
 her self-imposed duties to the nation 
 and the world. 
 
 The other of the two main questions 
 to ask is, what Chicago has done or can 
 be trusted to do to take care of, and make 
 safe and comfortable, the visitors to the 
 Fair. 
 
 The facilities for getting to and from 
 Chicago have not been open to ques- 
 tion. A railroad centre so phenomenal 
 can easily take the people to and from 
 the city. All of the great railways cen- 
 tring there and I believe there are 
 more than thirty small and great are, 
 however, making special preparations. 
 Additional tracks are laid in some in- 
 stances, and new rolling stock is be- 
 ing generally added. I am credibly in- 
 formed, too, that every terminal station 
 in the city, except one which has been 
 quite recently built and another which 
 will be entirely new, will have its facili- 
 ties materially increased. The railroad 
 managers are taking advantage of all 
 previous experience in handling crowds, 
 to provide against all delays and dis- 
 comforts that can possibly be foreseen. 
 
 The transportation of the people from 
 other parts of the city to the Fair pre- 
 sented difficulties which have been com- 
 pletely solved. All excursion trains 
 that is, all trains with passengers for 
 the Fair exclusively, no matter from 
 what distance, nor over what lines they 
 come will deliver their passengers over 
 the Belt lines, in the Fair grounds, with- 
 out entering the heart of the city at all, 
 and will take up their passengers at the 
 same place. The transportation facili- 
 ties within the city will be these : 
 
 1. Surface street-car lines, including 
 
 one first class cable line, which has in 
 anticipation just now doubled its capac- 
 ity by doubling its loop facilities. This 
 line has handled an immense Sunday 
 traffic easily without these extra facili- 
 ties. 
 
 2. A double-track elevated railroad 
 just completing, and therefore a new re- 
 source. 
 
 3. A boat system from the old city 
 front. This transportation will be in 
 the hands of one very responsible com- 
 pany. The vessels will be large, safe, 
 and well appointed ; and the company 
 is obliged to furnish a service equal to 
 at least fifteen thousand passengers per 
 hour. 
 
 4. The Illinois Central Railroad Com- 
 pany's right of way runs from the centre 
 of the city almost to the Fair grounds, 
 and consists of six tracks, two of which 
 are for suburban passenger traffic. The 
 right of way is being raised, and four 
 tracks being added for exclusive World's 
 Fair passenger traffic two for express 
 trains from and to the centre of the 
 city without stops, and two for trains 
 that stop at all city stations. These 
 four tracks will run into the World's 
 Fair grounds, where the terminal facil- 
 ities will be ample and perfect. The 
 facilities of this line, of course, could be 
 largely increased by 'the partial use of 
 its other tracks, but that will not in the 
 least be necessary. The line will be 
 protected by the latest and best auto- 
 matic block system ; and it is expected 
 to carry the bulk of the people. 
 
 5. The World's Fair is reached from 
 the heart of the city by parkways, and 
 many people will choose to drive. A 
 cheap cab system prevails, and the 
 streets are well supplied with hansoms 
 and other cabs. The cabs will of course 
 greatly increase. 
 
 6. Very many people, living or stop- 
 ping near the Fair grounds, will need 
 no conveyance. 
 
 Transportation within the grounds 
 will be all that could be wished. As all 
 the principal buildings are directly 
 reached by the interior water-courses 
 (which have a circuit of more than two 
 and a half miles) three classes of boats 
 will be used omnibus boats making 
 regular trips and stopping at each 
 building ; express boats making round 
 
556 
 
 CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 trips without stopping ; and boats an- 
 swering to cabs, to be hailed and en- 
 gaged for the trip or by the hour. 
 
 There will also be an elevated railway 
 making a five-mile circuit, and reach- 
 ing everywhere within the grounds ; 
 and finally there will be the usual roll- 
 ing chairs that are found at all Exposi- 
 tions in profusion. 
 
 But can visitors be comfortably 
 lodged ? It must be remembered that 
 when the numbers of admissions to 
 World's Fairs are mentioned, these do 
 not mean people. Visitors, of course, 
 multiply their visits. But in addition 
 to the multiplication of visits there is 
 to be borne in mind the fact that very 
 many of the visitors at all expositions 
 are the people of the city in which it is 
 held, or who come from distances that 
 admit of excursion trains. This greatly 
 reduces the apparent need of house ac- 
 commodation. It is a noteworthy fact 
 that Paris (at least as far as I could ob- 
 serve) didn't build a single new hotel, 
 or enlarge an old one, in 1889. 
 
 Then the mass of the visitors who will 
 need lodgings will wish moderate prices, 
 and will choose boarding-houses ; and 
 boarding-houses can rise in a night. 
 At Philadelphia there were boarding- 
 houses in profusion, because they could 
 so easily be improvised ; and so it will 
 be in Chicago, where people, as at the 
 Centennial, will turn an honest penny 
 by taking boarders or lodgers just as 
 far as the demand shall exist. And the 
 same is true of restaurants, which, how- 
 ever, are already in very abundant sup- 
 ply. The danger is not that there will 
 be too few restaurants, lodging, and 
 boarding houses, but that there will be 
 too many to be profitable. 
 
 But after all allowances are made, 
 there will be great use for hotels, and 
 especially for those of the highest grade. 
 That Chicago has always had hotel ac- 
 commodations ample for special occa- 
 sions is quite true, and great gatherings 
 like national conventions have chosen 
 it for that reason ; but lately, and es- 
 pecially in view of the World's Fair, ho- 
 tels have largely increased in number 
 (and they have also improved in qual- 
 ity). I recall four large hotels of the 
 first grade that have opened since Chi- 
 
 cago was given the Fair (besides the 
 Auditorium hotel, also opened about 
 that time), two that are opening now, 
 three nearing completion, and the du- 
 plicate Auditorium that is to be ready 
 next spring. There are other perma- 
 nent ones doubtless built or building not 
 seen by me ; and there are large hotels 
 to be improvised near the grounds, and 
 I think another permanent one about 
 which I am not particularly informed. 
 
 Of course all hotels can, if required, 
 increase their facilities by taking on 
 rooms near at hand ; and if there should 
 be need it would then be profitable to 
 temporarily use some of the great fire- 
 proof structures constantly going up. 
 Such extreme possibilities I only men- 
 tion to show how impossible it is that 
 an enterprising American city could be 
 without accommodation for expected 
 visitors ; but I think it will be clear 
 from the above that no extraordinary 
 provision will be necessary. Certainly 
 one would think not when the experi- 
 ence of Paris in 1889 is recalled. It 
 will, however, allay any remnant of ap- 
 prehension, if I state, after very good 
 authorities, that there are, great and 
 small, fourteen hundred hotels in the 
 city. 
 
 A bureau will be established by the 
 Directors, and another by the Lady 
 Managers, which will systematically aid 
 all who may require their services in 
 placing themselves satisfactorily. These 
 bureaus will have all the necessary in- 
 formation, and will have agencies at all 
 the stations ; but of course a variety of 
 private enterprises will anticipate a great 
 deal of the necessity for these services. 
 
 The police arrangements, I am defin- 
 itely assured by Major McClaughrey, 
 the able chief of police, are receiving 
 the fullest attention, and will be ample 
 and efficient. The force for the World's 
 Fair itself will not tax the general po- 
 lice force, but is a separate body which 
 has been organized and growing with 
 the Fair, under the command of Col- 
 onel Rice, of the United States Army. 
 It will consist of not less than five hun- 
 dred men. The city force has been 
 " taken out of politics," and has been 
 severely reorganized by Major Mc- 
 Claughrey ; and even in its political 
 days it was always effective in emergen- 
 
CHICAGO'S PART IN THE WORLD'S FAIR. 
 
 557 
 
 cies. It will number probably from 
 3,400 to 3,700 before the Fair "opens; 
 and will be greatly strengthened by the 
 new Bureau of Identification on the sys- 
 tem of M. Bertillon, of Paris, which is 
 an interesting feature of the prepara- 
 tions. This bureau will have the Bertil- 
 lon measurements of most of the prin- 
 cipal " crooks " and criminals of Europe 
 and America ; and the fact that their 
 identification by this dreaded system is 
 easy, will deter many from coming, so 
 that it would not be strange if Chicago 
 should become during the Fair less the 
 resort of the criminal classes than it, or 
 any great city, usually is. 
 
 A word now about the water-supply 
 of the city, for the reason that more or 
 less has been rather sensationally pub- 
 lished upon the subject, both in Eng- 
 land and America, in the way of warn- 
 ing to those intending to visit the Fail-. 
 The simple truth is that there will be no 
 trouble with the water-supply next year, 
 as there is hone now ; for Chicago has 
 now and will have then what it has al- 
 ways had, except for a few brief inter- 
 vals (which cannot now occur), the most 
 favorable water-supply enjoyed by any 
 of the great cities of the world. The 
 difficulty is to explain how any hubbub 
 has risen against water that is not only 
 not bad, but is good and wholesome 
 and delicious almost beyond compari- 
 son. Lake Michigan, which the city faces, 
 is the source of supply, and is a great 
 body of the freshest, clearest, coolest, 
 and purest water that can be imagined. 
 As a source of supply for a city it is 
 ideal. The drainage of the city is, of 
 course, not into the lake, but into the 
 Chicago River, which is also the port of 
 the city and leaves the lake port unused. 
 The course of the river was long ago 
 changed, and is not into but out of the 
 lake, and through a canal to the Illinois, 
 and so on to the Mississippi. Thus the 
 drainage flows westward over and be- 
 yond the lake's watershed, leaving the 
 lake itself as pure and clear as when it 
 was an Indian highway. 
 
 Then, why is there any criticism ? I 
 fear it must be admitted that enough 
 excitement was aroused by the contest 
 over the location of the World's Fair to 
 make criticism of Chicago rather entic- 
 VOL. XII. 60 
 
 ing, so that rigid investigation, which 
 might forestall it, isn't held to be ob- 
 ligatory. The starting-point of the story 
 which could easily have shown itself 
 to be but a temporary accident, against 
 whose effect a remedy was preparing 
 and then almost completed was a flood 
 in the Chicago River. In this year of 
 singular storms and downpours more 
 than one flood had occurred ; and when 
 the flood is heavy enough the devices 
 of engineering, pumping- works, and all 
 are overcome and the current of the 
 river is turned toward the lake. The 
 river drains such a very small district 
 that floods are not frequent and are of 
 very short duration ; and it is only the 
 exceptional ones that can carry the 
 river-stream very far beyond the shore 
 of the lake. Now, the water-supply has 
 been taken, since the city grew large, at 
 a point two miles from the shore, con- 
 siderably away from the direction of 
 the river, and considered to be beyond 
 the possible reach of the waters of a 
 flood. But as it was proven that, under 
 certain coincident conditions of wind 
 and flood, the waters of the river could 
 get that far, tunnels were undertaken 
 four miles long, to unimpeachable dis- 
 tance and depth, and they have just 
 been completed ; so that the remedy 
 was almost at hand when the criticism 
 arose. The new drainage undertaking, 
 which the city has just entered upon, in- 
 volving a probable outlay of thirty mil- 
 lions of dollars, confirms the fitness of 
 the present system, of which it is but 
 an elaboration meant to anticipate the 
 demands of a city of several millions of 
 people. When that is finished even 
 floods cannot affect the steady course of 
 the river, but will themselves suffer cap- 
 ture and be sent harmlessly into the 
 valley of the Mississippi. Meanwhile 
 the new tunnels make the water-supply 
 perfectly secure. Doubtless the World's 
 Fair has hastened these tunnels, but 
 they were begun before it was thought 
 of. And it may be said generally that 
 no city could be more careful at all 
 times, or more enterprising or indiffer- 
 ent to cost, in the protection of its 
 water-supply and the management of its 
 drainage ; and to this is doubtless due, 
 in large measure, the remarkable health- 
 fulness of the city. 
 
Hauteville House, the Residence of Victor Hugo, on the Island of Guernsey. 
 
 CONVERSATIONS AND OPINIONS OF VICTOR HUGO. 
 
 FROM UNPUBLISHED PAPERS FOUND AT GUERNSEY. 
 By Octave U^anne. 
 
 THE English weekly review, the Ath- 
 enceum, published in April last the 
 following curious information : 
 " Mr. Samuel Davey, archivist and ex- 
 pert in autographs, announces to us that 
 he has acquired & journal intime of Tic- 
 tor Hugo. ' The Journal of Exile/ con- 
 sisting of about two thousand pages of 
 close writing, as well as a thousand let- 
 ters addressed to the poet. These let- 
 ters were contained in six stout pack- 
 ages of divers papers, which the son of 
 Mr. Davey bought some veal's ago, and 
 which seem to have been sold by the 
 people of Hauteville House as so much 
 waste paper. The journal commences 
 in July, 1852. and goes to 1856. It is 
 a minute relation of the conversations 
 of Victor Hugo with his family, his 
 friends, and distinguished visitors, that 
 seems to have been written dav bv dav. 
 
 Victor Hugo must have reviewed this 
 journal himself with care. With his 
 own hand he has made corrections and 
 additions. The correspondence extends 
 over a period of nearly fifty years. It 
 comprises letters of a great number of 
 celebrated people writers, artists, mu- 
 sicians, actors, politicians, and political 
 refugees from all parts of the globe." 
 
 This note, furnished by a literary re- 
 view generally well informed, and of 
 which the authority is very great in the 
 United Kingdom, was enticing, and as I 
 found myself in London at the moment 
 when it appeared, I hastened instantly 
 to the house of the expert and dealer 
 in autographs, Mr. Samuel Davey, situ- 
 ated on Great Russell Street, immedi- 
 ately opposite the British Museum. 
 
 The worthy Mr. Davey, whom I now 
 count among my friends, received me