People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 August 1893 — AT THE WHITE CITY. [ARTICLE]

AT THE WHITE CITY.

Thk sofa that Grant and Lee sat upon at Appomattox when they arranged the surrender stands In the West Virginia building. It belonged to Andrew McLain, at whose house the generals met. It comes from Henry E. Stillman, who married Miss McLain. So there is no doubt about the genuineness. “Can you tell me whether there is a saloon near here?” asked a young woman airily of the rigid marine at guard on board the navy’s brick ship at the world’s fair. “I think you’ll find one over there,” said the marine, betraying considerable surprise as he pointed far across the grounds. Then he was astonished almost out of his military propriety by a peal of laughter. as the young woman said: “Oh, 1 mean a saloon of the ship.” Even the marine smiled as he indicated the way to the wardroom. Chicago is a big city. And she does things on a big scale, in a big way. As for the fair, it is not only bigger than any previous effort of a like nature, but it is far more artistic. One looks back upon it as upon a dream of another world, a magic creation on an unheard-of scale. No words can convey a just impression of the effect produced by this triumph of art and architecture. Life takes off his hat to the American city having the public spirit, the energy and the consummate taste to summon such glories into existence. —N. Y. Life. There is now to be seen in the Midway Plaisance in Chicago Herr Poliak, who claims to be the fastest talker in the world. He has a repertory of twenty thousand words, which he repeats'in forty minutes, being at the rate of five hundred words a minute. These words are in no way connected and make no sense, the rapidity of their enunciation being the sole feature of Herr Poliak’s performance. He places himself under bonds to repeat no words, and offers forty thousand florins, which he carries with him, to any stenographer who can take down what he says. At the Esquimau village on the world’s fair grounds, sealskins and other heavy clothing have been abolished by the forty Esquimaux, men, women and children, and an equal number of Esquimau dogs, which look like little wolves, look as if they would like to get rid of their heavy coats of fur in this unusual, to them, summer weather. Many huts, built in true Esquimau fashion, and one simulated ice hut lined with drying skins, are clustered near a little Moravian chapel, and the appearance is an admirable representative of genuine Esquimau life. The short, stout and swarthy natives are mild and good-humored, and endure with resignation the life which cannot be too happy. At the trading post one may buy canning little dolls, dressed in full suits of white fur, snowshoes, canoes, moccasins, furs and baskets. The Fisheries building on the world’s fair grounds is always crowded with visitors. It is a pleasantly-cool building to visit on a warm day because of the amount of running water within and the general style of architecture, though it is much smaller than most of the special buildings. There are complete exhibits of fishing products and fishing boats and implements from Norway, Sweden, Russia, Canada, Ceylon, Germany, Great Britain and our own country; shells, corals, cured fish and models of fish hatcheries and fish ways; mounted aquatic birds in great numbers; specimens of fish and casts of fish from many lands, and, festooning the entire rotunda, are great brown nets, one of them three thousand feet long. There are so many life-size dummies dressed in fisherman's costume, sitting in boats, climbing masts or hauling in fish that the newly-arrived visitor is at first quite sure that he is in the midst of living and breathing fisher folk. The external decorations of the building are grotesque figures of all sorts of sea animals.