The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1876-06-22

wandering about through the Main Hall,
crammed to repletion with all sorts of
indescribable beauties and wonders,
gathered from the four quarters of the
earth and the scattered islands of the sea-
Marvellous indeed are they-wonders
such as few of US can expect to see again
but here is an exhibition of over three
hundred buildings, many of them worlds
in themselves, containing vast stores OF
wealth, and grand contributions of genius
which must be seen but cannot be de-
scribed. Buildings whose names afford
not the slightest indication of the treas
ures they possess, or the uses to which
they are applied, and the character 1
here give, applies particularly to the
Agricultural Department, department
too little appreciated and too little known,
and the treasures of which have been
neglected by the great mass of Centen-
NAL visitors, many of whom pass whole
days in the Main Hall and Art Gallery,
admiring pitchers and vases, meerschaum
pipes, silverware, statues and paintings
things entirely beyond their reach, and
which they can never hope to possess.
The building itself, when seen from
the distance, looks like some old abbey,
being in the form of cross, and all of its
cupolas, steeples and turrets are sur
mounted by crosses, which give it quite
religious and respectable appearance.
The building is about eight hundred and
twenty-six feet on each of its sides, and
contains within its walls as much of in
terest as any other building on the
grounds. 1t is positive relief to get
away from the glittering gewgaws and
things that surround you in the Main
Hall. There everything is suggestive of
the most extravagant luxury, wealth and
ease, the surest index of nations ruin.
The richest of silverware, the costliest of
carpets, the rarest works of art, laces and
jewels are around you on every side.
Everything about you tells of wealth and
ostentation, but the moment you step
into Agricultural Hall you are in another
world. Your eyes are no longer tortured
by visions of wealth away beyond your
reach and unpleasantly reminding you of
the multitude of grades above you, for
while there is wealth untold within this
mighty building, you feel that it is
among the possibilities, that part of it
may one day be yours. Here are no
jewels, no gold, no silver, no diamonds,
but the square products of hard and hon
est toll, the fundamental elements of indi-
vidual success and the primary sources
of a nations wealth and greatness.
When most people think of Agricultu-
raj Hall, who have not visited it, visions
of huge pumpkins, gigantic cabbages,
enormous beets and extraordinary pota-
toes Immediately float before their dis
ored imaginations, and you will be some
what surprised to learn, no doubt, that
there is not one of the articles l have
named, to be found within the Agricul-
tural Building, if except a half dozen
dishes of potatoes left there by some am
bilious amateur about two weeks ago.
1t is not only the products of agriculture
in the way of cereals and seeds, but by
what may seem strange misnomer of
classification, many things are so remote
in their relationships, that it requires
sometimes pretty acute knowledge of
logic to observe its particular bearing on
the business of agriculture. In one por-
ton of the hall is Il gigantic stuffed
giraffe. Two countrymen, the other day,
went up to examine him. One said,
"Joc, don't see what that thar critter
has got to do with agriculture" "You
DON'T" replied his friend, "Why any fool
could sec that that beast was an agricul-
tural production. Now amt grass an
agricultural production, en- don't he eat
grass and YARDS and cocoanuts, and amt
them agricultural productions; and amt
he stuffed with hay, and amt that an
agricultural production; in course it is"
And so he walked away. Locke himself
never arrived at as logical a sequence.
Asyou enter the south door, you realize
the difference between the building you
arc in, and all you have seen before. On
the left-hand, as if guarding the portals,
is the wine exhibit of Sohnlicn of
Rhicms. Monster bottles crown the
gates, such as the Titans might have
used millions of years before the present
pigmy race was thought of. What
mighty draughts these pondcrous bottles
suggcst-down throats like rolling rivers,
and into stomachs like boundless seas
they seem to tell of oxhaustless plenty
which laughs to scorn all thoughts Of
economy or thrift, and cries out, "Drink
again, drink again, and keep on drinking
till doomstay rings. You can never,
never, drink me dry" and reminding
you of the old drinking song,
.Oh that 4 Dutchman's draught might be,
Deep Us the rolling Zuydcr Zee
That there may be no partiality i'll the
way of drinks, while the left portal is
guarded by Rhenish wine, the right is
fanked by good old Irish whisky-whcre
it stands wholesome warning to all cru
saders, and fountain of delight to all
lovers of mountain dew. Usquabaugh
and all those decctable compounds,
against which Father Matthew launched
the Anathcma Marinatha. Passing un-
i