A very curious legend is associated with the Darby episode. We do not know how well it is founded, but we give it here:—

The men whom he had deceived tarred and feathered him. In this disgraceful garment of woe, looking like a gigantic half-plucked bird, he ran away, and found shelter for the night in the cellar of one of the quiet farmsteads.

The next morning the good woman of the house had occasion to go down into the cellar. Her soap barrel, pork barrels, and probably cider barrels were there.

A dark place is an old-time New England cellar,—dark and damp, with an earthy smell. Lights burned low there.

Our good woman probably passed around the foundation walls of the great chimney, where was a flue for ashes, passed the potato-bins and turnip covers, and, with peering eyes, looked down on one of the many platforms for barrels.

Cellars were haunted places. There was an awful story of a woman who murdered her husband, and hid his body under the ash barrel, that had taken hold of popular imagination in those revengeful times, and most people thought of it as they made their uncertain ways around the cellars. It was all poky and still, grewsome and tomb-like.

Our good woman heard a noise. That was not strange. Cats and rats dwelt in the cellar, and the latter came out of their hiding-places when the former were not at home.

She was ill prepared for what followed.

There arose up before her an awful object. Whatever ghost-stories she may have heard by kitchen fires in the long evenings, she had never had any account of anything like this.

Its body was like that of Apollyon, as represented in the never-to-be-forgotten picture in the “Pilgrim’s Progress.” But it wore the feathers of a goose.

Erupit! evasit! Our good woman ascended the cellar stairs with a celerity that spoke well for the power of latent nervous force. The dreadful figure followed her, begging for mercy, and confessing that he was Darby the Impostor. The poor woman supplied his wants, and probably provided him with a suit of clothes, when he disappeared from society forever.

O UT of this legendary and story-telling atmosphere, the three Marlowes passed through the country in beautiful June, and found themselves, in the longest days of the year, in that wonder-city of the new world,—Chicago.

“The first story that we will have to hear,” said Mr. Marlowe, “will be that of the Fair itself.”

THE STORY OF THE FAIR.

If ever there was a man with the heart and intelligence to welcome the world, it is Judge Bonney, whose generous spirit and hearty words millions of people will remember. As the leading mind of the Exposition’s Auxiliary Congresses, as many as possible of the delegates to the many Congresses met him, and the questions which he answered in the Art Palace in Chicago, would have filled many Bibles. We hope that he took a long rest after the close of the Exposition, for no man ever better earned such a right.

With a patience that was beautiful, and ought to serve as a national lesson, he met every one courteously, and every last person that met him felt that he had found a friend, and left him rejoicing that the newly-collected world was so friendly in its representative. His intelligence was equal to his courtesy, and his tact to both. The people all have good wishes forever for Judge Bonney.

Our trio had been told to report to Judge Bonney. They found him at his desk in the Art Palace in the city, and one look from him assured them that they were expected.

“Judge,” said Ephraim the elder, “I have called with my son here, who is a delegate to the Folk-Lore Congress. There are a few things about the Fair that I would like to know.”

“I shall be most happy to give you any information that I have, my friend. Sit down, sit down.” We give the judge’s answers from a general memory of like scenes.

“I thank thee, friend Bonney.”

“I see that you are a Quaker,” said Judge Bonney. “There are several people here already who are interested in the Folk-Lore Congress. I will see that you are introduced to them. What are some of the questions which you wish to ask?”

“Well, friend Bonney, what is the history of this great Fair? How did it originate?”

“In the minds of many, who agreed to act as one,” we may imagine the answer to have been. We shall speak of this topic again. We are inclined to the belief that the secret of the success of the Fair may be found in the fact of this supposed answer.

“By whom was Chicago selected as the site of the Fair?”

“This city was selected as the site of the Fair by vote of the National House of Representatives, February 24, 1890.”

“What other cities were voted upon?”

“New York, St. Louis, and Washington.”

“When did Congress authorize the Fair?”

“The Act of Congress authorizing the Fair was approved April 25, 1890. This was followed by the President’s Proclamation, inviting all nations to participate, which was issued December 24, 1890. The World’s Fair Grounds were dedicated October 21, 1892. Preceding the opening of the Fair, May 1, 1893, was the grand Naval Review in New York Harbor, April 26, 27, 28, 1893.”

“How about the appropriations, friend Bonney? Where did the money come from?”

“From various sources. The States and territories appropriated nearly $5,000,000, and foreign countries nearly $6,000,000. The capital stock amounts to $5,000,000, the City of Chicago Bonds to $5,000,000, the Souvenir half-dollars (appropriated by Congress), to $2,500,000, and the Debenture Bonds to $4,000,000.”

“What is the total value of the exhibits?”

“It is estimated to be $300,000,000.”

“What will the Fair cost?”

“The total estimated expense is $21,250,000.”

“How many visitors are expected?”

“It is expected that there will be about 20,000,000 visitors.”

“The gate receipts from them would amount to $10,000,000. How much ground does the Fair cover?”

“The total number of acres in the Exposition Grounds is 633, of which Jackson Park occupies 553 acres, the Midway Plaisance, 80, the space available for buildings, 556, and the Interior Waterways (61 acres) and Wooded Island, 77.”

“Now I wish to know something about the size of the different buildings. Which is the largest one?”

“The Manufactures Building is the largest. It is 1,687 feet long, and 787 feet wide, covering 44 acres of floor. Its cost was $1,600,750. Of the other buildings, the Stock Sheds cover 25 acres, the Machinery Building and Annex, 23.2 acres, the Agricultural Building and Annex, 19 acres, the Transportation Building, 17.9 acres, the Electricity Building, 9.3 acres, the Building of Mines, 8.5 acres, and the Building of Horticulture, 8 acres. The total number of acres covered by buildings is 240.”

“How much did they cost, Judge Bonney?”

“Twelve million two hundred and sixty-seven thousand dollars.”

“How many other World’s Fairs have been held, and where?”

“Between the years 1851 and 1889, eight World’s Fairs were held,—two of them in London, four in Paris, one in Vienna, and one in Philadelphia.”

“How does the size of the grounds here compare with those of the other World’s Fairs, Judge Bonney?”

“Of the previous World’s Fairs, that of Paris in 1889 covered the largest area—200 acres—which is not quite one third the size of this.”

“How many visitors had that Fair?”

“Twenty-eight million, one hundred and forty-nine thousand, three hundred and fifty-three.”

“Now, Judge Bonney, tell me about the World’s Fair Auxiliary and its Congresses, of which you are the representative. When do the Congresses meet, and where?”

“There are nineteen Departments of the Congresses of the World Fair Auxiliary. Each lasts usually a week. In May we held the Congress of Woman’s Progress, Public Press, and Medicine; in June, will be those of Temperance, Moral and Social Reform, and Commerce and Finance; in July, of Music, Literature, Education, Engineering, and Art; in August, of Government, Science and Philosophy, and Labor; in September, of the Departments of Religion; and in October, the closing month of the Fair, those of Sunday Rest, Public Health, and Agriculture.”

The good judge took the trio into the Hall of Columbus and the Hall of Washington, and the various art rooms in the Palace where the Congresses were to meet. The engines shrieked as they passed the sunny windows, and the blue lake rolled afar as in fathomless distance. The world seemed on the march in the great avenues below the balconies. Near by rose the Great Auditorium, and near it a colossal bridge led the way to the steamers and cars.

How bright and happy the world looked from the open windows of the smoke-colored Art Palace. As they passed one of those windows, the White City some miles distant, gleamed afar over the blue lake like a radiant vision. Constantinople from the Golden Horn was not as celestial and beautiful.

“White, Judge Bonney,” said old Ephraim.

“Yes, my friend, it is built of Staff.”

“Judge Bonney, what is Staff?”

“Staff is a mixture of plaster—often called plaster of Paris—and a small per cent of cement, into which are introduced frequent fibres of hemp, jute, or Sisal grass, to give it toughness, so that it may be bent, sawn, nailed, or bored, at will.”

“How is it cast?”

“It is cast in moulds. The plaster and cement are first wet up to the consistency of thick treacle, a layer of which is spread on the well-lubricated mould. Then follows a layer of the long, tough fibres; over this is poured another coating of the liquid plaster, covering in the fibre and filling the mould to the required depth.”

“Are there many moulds?”

“Yes, there are a thousand or more of different patterns and sizes, from those for casting plain staff-board for walls, to those for the most complex, beautiful, or fantastic ornamentation.”

“Are statues ever made of it?”

“Yes, both statues and statuary groups. The moulds are first fashioned in clay, then coated with staff.”

“How long does it take to make it ready for use?”

“Oh, in the course of half an hour the composition hardens sufficiently to be handled and taken away to the buildings in process of construction.”

“How long will it last?”

“If kept painted, it will withstand the weather for a number of years. If it cracks or crumbles off, it can readily be repaired with a brush or trowel, from a tub of the liquid mixture. It is fireproof, and, to a great degree, waterproof.”

“They say, Judge Bonney, that there is a sidewalk there that goes all by itself. Is that so? Tell us all about it.”

“The Multiple Speed Sidewalk is also called the Travelling Sidewalk, or the Locomotive Sidewalk. It is a mechanical device for facilitating travel on the long pier—nearly one half a mile long and two hundred and fifty feet wide—near the Peristyle, thus enabling the tourist to make the trip over the pier in ease and comfort, refreshed by the lake breeze. The sidewalk, which traverses the entire length of the pier on one side, returns on the other, making a loop at each end. It is on low wheels. There are two parallel sections, or platforms, one moving at a rate of three miles an hour, about ordinary walking speed, and the other at six miles an hour, an easy driving rate. One may ride on either section.”

The Judge led the trio back to his room. It was crowded with people seeking information.

“I am obliged to you, Judge Bonney, for those bits of information. But what are these few things that I have learned to a Fair like that? I’ll call again, Judge Bonney, and give you a chance to tell us some more. ’Tisn’t often that I find a man so well stocked with information about the world.”

Judge Bonney did not look tired. With a serene face he met the crowd awaiting him, many of whom would ask him these questions over again. Our fancied interview is but a picture of the Judge’s work for nearly a year.

The Marlowes, under the influence of the officers of the World’s Auxiliary, who invited them to a literary reception soon after their arrival, arranged to spend their home-life in Chicago with Mr. and Mrs. Edmand, who led a Folk-Lore Society which met at their home on Michigan Avenue. The Edmands family were from New England, and had known the Marlowes by reputation, and received them as their guests. It was agreed between the Edmands and their guests that the Folk-Lore Society should meet every Saturday evening, and that, on these occasions, the Marlowes should relate as a part of the exercises Folk-Lore stories.

The first of these stories that was told at the Saturday evening meetings was “Miraculous Susan of Quaker Hill.” It was told by Grandfather Marlowe, and we shall give it in its place. Another of these stories was “Hannah, Who Sang Countre.” It was told by Mr. Marlowe, who illustrated it by singing old-time tunes. This we shall also give in an interval between the sight-seeing at the Fair.

T HE first purpose of our tourists was to see Chicago, the wonder of the West.

They began at the Art Palace, where the statue of La Salle met their view on the boulevard, bringing to mind those December days of 1681, when the bold explorer coasted along the southern shore of Lake Michigan, and ascended the Chicago River, on his way to the Mississippi. Did he dream on that day that he entered the Chicago that the live city of the West would be there?

There were great arches of bridges between the statue and the Art Palace, and all the world seemed passing to the railroad and the boats. The Lake rolled in splendor before the towering buildings, but everything, the Art Palace included, seemed discolored with smoke. The doors of the great Art Palace stood open, as it were, to receive the homeless multitudes, coming from everywhere. It was the hospitable door of Chicago.

It was a short walk from the Art Palace to the Auditorium Building, which is a grand hotel and a theatre, and whose corridors might have been halls of the Pharaohs, they are so dazzling, airy, and beautiful. Every one here seemed to be in a hurry. If each one’s life were to be fated to end with the day, no one could be more in a hurry. Yet every one looked happy; it was not an anxious hurry, but an inspired hurry. New York is slow and Boston slower, but here is the clock of destiny, and one must do, ere it strike. The Chicagoan loves Chicago, and resolves to make it the grandest city in the world.

The dream is likely to be fulfilled. Our good Quaker friend said to a boy in the pillared waiting-room of the Auditorium:

“My boy, how many miles is it to Boston?”

The boy gave a lightning glance, gathered up his mouth for one long breath, and answered:—

“Thirty-two hours from Boston (1150 miles); twenty-nine hours from Montreal; twenty-six hours from New York; twenty-four hours from Philadelphia; twenty-six hours from Washington; three and a half days from San Francisco; five days from the City of Mexico; nine days from Queenstown; ten days from Paris; fifteen days from Rome, and sixteen from St. Petersburg. Are there any other places that you would like to inquire about?”

“The land of the ocean! No, not now. You seem to know all about the world. Who is your father, my lad?”

“Daddyism don’t count in Chicago. You came from the East.”

“Yes, I came from the East; and how might a man from the East best see Chicago?”

“Take an elevator—don’t you know the dining-room here is up top, and the roof sweeps the city, the Lake, the Fair and everything!”

“Take an elevator?” said our sedate friend. “I never take any; I favor temperance principles.”

“Oh, then take the elevator. There, it is running now!”

“How many inhabitants do you claim, my lad?”

The answer was as extraordinary as the first:—

“South Division, half a million and more; West Division, half a million and more; North Division, quarter of a million and more. I reckon we are about two million in all. Can’t keep the run of the census here.”

“My boy, if I should conclude to go to Lincoln’s tomb at Springfield, what road would I take?”

The answer was more amazing still:—

“Oh, take the C. A. or the A. T. S. F. and change, or the C. A. and change, or the C. I. If you take the C. A. or the A. T. S. F. or the C. I., you will have to change in this way”—Here the boy began such a distortion of the alphabet as could only be heard in a primary school.

“Do you know all the railroads that go out of Chicago?” asked the Quaker.

“Most of them. There’s the A. T. and S. F; the B. and O.; the C. B. and Q.; the C. E. and L. S.; the C. M. and S. P.; the C. R. I. and P.; the C. S. P. and K. C.; the C. and A.; the C. and E.; the C. and E. I.; the C. and G. T.; the C. and N.; the C. and N. P.; the C. and S.; the C. and W. M.; the C. and W. I.; the C. C. C. and S. L., which is the Big 4; the I. C.; the L. S. and M. C.; the M. C.; the M. L. S. and W.; the M. P.; the N. Y. C. and St. L. Nickle Plate; the P. F. W. and W.; and the W. C.”

“If you wish to go to Springfield by a zigzag, picturesque kind of route, take the—” Here the boy went off into the alphabet again.

“I am afraid I would never get there,” said our good friend, with uplifted hands. “I think that we have about concluded to go to Lincoln Park.”

The party did not find this an easy matter. They went to State Street; the sidewalks were thronged with hurrying crowds; high buildings towered in the sunny and smoky air.

“If I were to come to Chicago,” said the confused Quaker, “I would go into the business of collars and cuffs. Mine were clean when I started out—just see them now! But everybody looks clean; how do they do it?”

After many directions from policemen, the party found the car for the famous park which is the delight and summer rest of Chicago. How lovely it was! The great bronze statue of Lincoln arose before the province of greenery; the Lake rippled near, expanding in purple glory. They hurried toward the Zoölogical Gardens, which are among the finest in the world. The parks and park lands of Chicago are many, and cover nearly two thousand acres. But Lincoln Park, with its lake view and animal shows, has a charm that exceeds all others, and not the least of its attractions is “Admission Free.”

On their return from the park, where they visited the Grant Statue, the flower gardens, and the wonderful collections of tamed animals, the party went to the Auditorium Building, and looked down from the top on the city as it lay spread out in the sunset. How different was the scene from the fort and little hamlet in 1830! The city practically filled the view.

The Post Office and Masonic Buildings are works of marvellous strength and beauty; the stranger would pause in awe before them, did not the crowd at all hours of the day hurry him on. One cannot conveniently stop to talk on the streets in the activity of this rapid city. The Women’s Temple is one of the noblest structures ever erected for benevolent work by women, and the Produce Exchange fittingly expresses its purpose.

The Palmer House is associated with the history of the city since the fire, as few other buildings have been. There are few business men in the country who have not at some time stopped there. The beautiful private residence of its proprietor is famous for its hospitality, and is as unique as it is noble. The women of America are proud of the record of Mrs. Potter Palmer, and are glad that a woman of such public spirit can organize her plans in such a liberal home. The private residences of Mr. Kimball, Mr. McVeach, and the long procession of mansions on Michigan Avenue, display an air, not of ease and rest, but of purpose and energy. They picture the spirit of the times.

There are few public buildings in Europe that display a more massive grandeur than the City Hall. It looks like a colossal palace reared upon lofty foundations, and one from abroad would think that such a structure would have cost the labor of a score of years. The city is full of buildings from eight to sixteen or more stories high, that look like towers.

The Union Stock-Yards here are the largest in the world. They cover three hundred and fifty or more acres with more than eight miles of streets,—a city of cattle. More than $200,000,000 worth of live-stock are sold here annually.

Chicago is the world’s granary. Her grain-elevators would make a city. She handles some 150,000,000 bushels of grain a year.

The Chicago River in 1830 flowed clear and full in view. It is now shut into bridges, and is hardly noticed. The arrival and clearances of vessels in Chicago harbor greatly exceed those of New York, and are probably as many as or more than at the ports of New York and Boston combined.

The lofty and substantial buildings greatly interested the good Quaker, and on returning to the waiting-room of the Auditorium, he met the bright boy who had given him such luminous instructions in regard to the railroads.

“Well, I found the park,” said our friend.

“Took the N. C. S. or W. S. cable, I suppose?” said the boy.

“I think so; the X. Y. Z. or Q. R. S. T. it might have been. I like that park; it is like the story that had no end. What are your very tallest houses here, my lad?”

“There’s the Ashland Block, sixteen stories high; this Auditorium, seventeen stories high; C. C. B., thirteen stories high; C. M. B., fourteen stories high; M. B., sixteen stories high; and the Masonic Building, twenty stories high.”

“There, there, that will do—twenty stories high!”

“There are many others, sir; the U. B., sixteen stories high, and—”

“You needn’t go over the alphabet any more. Why, boy, it would make me crazy to live here. My house isn’t but two stories high; it is an A. B. C. D. house in the perpendicular style of architecture.”

The party went to the great pork-packing establishment. Here the poor pig has hardly a chance to squeal between his easy rural life and sausage meat. The name of Mr. P. D. Armour is associated with an industry, or business, such as the good New England farmer never dreamed of in his simple life, when two pigs, killed after an heroic struggle, were the supply for his frugal pork barrel. Corn, beef, and pork are supply cities by themselves.

The railroad stations, too, would constitute a city. What wonder that the boys say C. B. Q. and I. C. and C. N. W. and C. S. M. W. D.!

The city stretches into suburbs, which themselves widen away and exhibit the outlines of new suburbs. The Hyde Park suburb, Pullman, and other towns that make a semi-circle, are in themselves famous. The Mississippi Valley, the old East, the great lake country of the North,—all seem to focus here. Chicago will be the City of the Twentieth Century.

The eastern and the old world tourists come here, with narrow views and criticism, to which the true Chicagoan has neither the time nor the interest to so much as listen. When this type of man enters into the spirit of Chicago, and feels the new life, he often becomes wonderfully enthusiastic. He lives for the future, and under new horizons; his soul becomes prophetic; he feels that the age of humanity is at hand, and that the city by the great inland sea is to be the capital; and he merges himself in the multitude, and his private interest becomes the good of the whole. All of the enterprises are his; all of the builders are building for him. He has a part in every new structure, enterprise, and beautiful house. One cannot understand this spirit until he has felt it.

The men who lead, inspire him. Davis, Palmer, Pullman, Armour, the grain-merchants, the public officers, are self-made men. Invention and energy are here rewarded. The whole spirit of the place says “Advance;” progress proclaims “I will.” Force and Chicago are one.

Go to the Temple, the scene of the activities of the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union. It cost a million of dollars. It is the centre of the work of the largest organization of women in the world; of ten thousand moral reform societies in the country. All its directors are women.

Glance at the life of its President, Miss Frances Elizabeth Willard: of New England ancestry, educated at Oberlin, taking a front rank as an educator, living now on the platform, and wherever she goes carrying her pen in hand. She projected the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, is the leader of the White Cross work, and one of the leaders of the National Council of Women. She has set her New England character everywhere in the West. She represents what the true Chicago woman means to be to her age and generation. What does such an example say to girls? What to all aspirators towards a worthy life?

Stand before the hospitable doors of the castle-like mansion where Mrs. Potter Palmer has been accustomed to receive all worthy workers in the cause of humanity and progress. One is proud to feel, in the atmosphere of such a place, that in America queens are born, and that their social thrones are won by nobility. That woman and her friends gave to the Exposition a soul, or made the White City voice what is spiritual. Such women put reform into stone and called it the Temple. They will one day begin a daily journalism that shall lead all that is best in the mind and heart of mankind.

Go to Pullman, some ten miles away. It has been called the model town of the working-men. What does such a suburb say to the American youth? Mr. George M. Pullman once rode on an old-fashioned sleeping-car. He found it a hard experience. He did not sleep. But out of that experience he invented. The Pullman Sleeping Car was the result. People now travel and sleep. “Invent what is needed,” so says Pullman.

Mr. Pullman began life as a clerk in a country store. He now owns a town and employs fifteen thousand people. “Answer the world’s needs,” says the spirit of the thrifty town, “and you shall be supplied in the supply.”

The builders of the expanding city by the Lake were poor boys. Invention, energy, honesty made their success. Like Dr. Livingston, when he graduated from Glasgow University, most of them can say,—“I never had a dollar that I did not earn!” They do not merely exist,—they live. When they have passed their generation they will have left behind them a new creation of life.

T AKING a Cottage Grove car, the Marlowes entered the Fair Grounds on one beautiful summer morning, by the long way of the Midway Plaisance, in search of the Funniest Thing, the Most Useful Thing, and the Grandest Thing.

The sky was as blue as the Lake, and the Lake as blue as the sky on this morning, and the sun filled the sky with living light, and under it shone the White City, the most beautiful city on which the sun ever shone,—the city of all the ideals of the past and the hopes of the future, the first city of the new order of the world.

They passed the turn-style, and looking round, saw the word exit.

“I will tell you a funny story which I heard at the boarding-house in regard to that word,” said young Ephraim. “There was an Illinois boy who had earned money enough to go to the Fair, and fifty cents to go in, and he planned to enter early and stay late, and so see all of the Fair in one day. He paid his fifty cents for a ticket, and passed through the turn-style, and looked up and read ‘E-x-i-t.’ ‘Does it cost anything to go in there?’ he asked of an officer. ‘Of course not,’ answered the officer. ‘Then I must see it,’ he said; ‘I want to see everything.’ And he saw it.”

“I do not regard that as a funny story,” said Mr. Marlowe. “I could hardly think of anything more pathetic. How that poor boy must have felt when he found himself on the outside. It would be like entering a gate of Paradise, and going back by some by-way into the world again. I shall not put that among the funny stories in my note-book.”

The long Plaisance, which was an avenue where lived nearly all of the nations of the world in harmony, swept before them, and over it gleamed the towers and domes of the White City.

If young Ephraim’s story was pathetic rather than funny, an incident occurred at their first journey up the Plaisance which was comical.

A street performer was taking gold crowns or sovereigns out of his nose.

The trio stopped to witness the wonderful feat. When the wonder-worker wanted a gold piece, he had only to tap his nose, and out it would come.

Old Ephraim, whose quiet Quaker life had not made him much acquainted with such tricks, looked on with curious surprise.

“Where do those gold pieces come from?” he asked.

“Out of my nose!” said the juggler. “Don’t you see?”

“It does look so, but thee can’t trust experience always, so Kant says. Let me see thee do that again.”

“Here you see the gold pieces in my hand. See! Now I will close my hand. See! Now the coins are in my nose. You can’t see. Now I will take them out again. See!”

He did.

“That is a very wonderful thing to do, my friend. I never saw the like of it before. Suppose now you put those gold pieces into my pocket here, and see if you can take them out again!”

The man of wonders stared, and shook his head.

“Na, na. Where you come from? You be one Yankee. Goot day!”

The Plaisance was thronging with bright, happy faces. Orientals mingled with the people from all the States. Our trio stopped at the Indian Village, and thence went to the Dahomey Village. All the world seemed to be at home, and prosperous, happy, and hospitable. Here were Austrian houses; yonder Chinese pavilions, like golden air. Along one side of the avenue ran a sleighing track, where swift sleighs glided over a snow-scene under the burning sun. Here was the Roman Village; yonder the Tower of Babel loomed over the whole. Here was a Moorish palace, yonder Dutch settlements; here an ostrich farm, there Asian and African bazaars, and mid these neighboring families of the world, a glory of mosques and minarets.

The trio hurried on towards the gleaming minarets, the captive balloon, and the Ferris Wheel.

They stopped at the Ferris Wheel, and looked up into the air.

“That is the greatest merry-go-round in all the world,” said a clever-looking visitor.

“Let us go over,” said young Ephraim to his father.

“Had we better go over now, or had we better wait until another day?”

“Now,” said young Ephraim.

“Now,” said his grandfather. “I always wanted to see the world, and I shall when I circle sky in those hanging cars.”

The trio entered one of the cars, and sat down in the chairs.

“It is just like a room,” said old Mr. Marlowe. “I do believe that we are moving up.”

Slowly the earth began, as it seemed, to descend, and they found themselves in the air. The horizon grew; the great blue lake, the White City in dazzling whiteness, moved into view, and then sank downward; the smoky city of Chicago rose, and fell into the shadows. Slowly, slowly the car moved up towards the sky.

“We shall see the whole earth soon,” said Grandfather Marlowe.

But no—the car was descending, and Chicago, the White City, and the Lake and the merry Plaisance, all came back again. They went over a second time. The stranger was right,—it was the greatest merry-go-round in all the world.

As they passed the wheel the wonders grew. They stopped to see the Hagenback menageries, or animal shows. In the arena was a lion that drove a chariot and rode on horseback. Grandfather Marlowe said that he disapproved of all such “doin’s;” but his opinion grew out of sympathy for the horse.

Near the Blarney Castle and Irish Village was an old-time New England cottage, where meals were served in colonial style; and across the way was a model working-men’s house, after which pattern 172,000 houses had been built in the suburbs of Philadelphia, by a wise and worthy building association. These houses cost about twenty-two hundred dollars, and were paid for out of small savings, through co-operative banks and like means. The purpose of the noble Philadelphia Society was to make good citizens by such homes. It requires character to save money; it forms prudent habits to lay aside money for a home in early life.

The trio visited this model house. It was the perfection of home-like beauty and convenience.

“I think,” said Mr. Marlowe, “that I have found in this house the most useful thing at the Fair. One would have to travel far to meet with anything more useful than that. The most useful thing on earth is a home. I think that I have found one thing to report to our Society, and I have not seen the Fair yet.

“Every city,” he added, “ought to do what Philadelphia has done, if it would make good citizens. Think of it, 172,000 houses for working-people, like that! The millennium must be near!”

“I think,” said Grandfather Marlowe, “that that is the most useful thing that we shall see. It is worth coming all the way here just to see that.”

“But,” said young Ephraim, “that is the most simple thing we have met.”

They went out of the house. The avenue seemed swarming.

“Pretty much all of the world must be here by this time,” said Grandfather Marlowe, “and there seems to be more coming. I declare it does beat all!”

The Ferris Wheel was turning in the bright air; the villages were filled with shouts and music.

Suddenly there was a great excitement among the crowds near. An Oriental wedding procession was coming out into the avenue from the “Street in Cairo.”

The trio stopped to gaze at the wonder. “Let us go into the Street of Cairo,” said young Ephraim.

“No, not to-day,” said Mr. Marlowe; “I have been reading about that street: we must take a whole day for that.” The trio passed under the long dark bridge. Slowly from the shadow they entered the White City.

Ephraim Marlowe the Quaker stopped and stamped three times on the ground as the dazzling splendor rose before him. He lifted his hand, and said, “Manton, Manton, for pity’s sake!”

They passed the Woman’s Building, and the Transportation Building with its dazzling entrance, which looked as though it were a sunrise of jewels, and came to the Administration Building, whose pale gold dome shone like a vision about to vanish into the air. They mounted the steps, turned, and looked down the Court of Honor, towards the Peristyle and Lake Michigan.

The three stood in silence. Mr. Marlowe laid his hand on his father’s shoulder, and shed tears. His son took him by the hand.