Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1893-05-24

acCe-but you viii never realize their vast
ness till you have seen them. You will
not perfectly appreciate their proportions
till you have seen them many times. They
are like mountains in one respect. They
possess the optical delusiveness which &C
companies great hight or size. For in
stance, from the upper end of the grounds
the golden dome of the Administration
building and the mighty eXpanse of the
Manufactures or main building appear
but little distance away. The stranger
has no doubt of his ability to walk to them
in two or three minutes. Yet they are
nearly n mile and a quarter distant in a
direct line. Every view and every build
ing on the grounds deceives you in the
same way.
If You stand at the peristyle and look up
the central basin at the Administration
building your estimate of the distance viii
be, probably, two or three hundred yards.
When you walk it you will find it the
longest 300 yards you ever saw. The exact
distance is $50 feet, or more than n third
of a mile, Similarly, the Administration
building will not seem to you n large
structure. 1t is so compact, so SYM
metrical, so perfect, and surrounded by
such magnificent palaces that your eye is
deceived. Consult your guide-book and
you will find that it is 262 feet square
which means that it covers more than an
acre and half of ground. Each of the
four pavilions which form its corners is
eighty-four feet square, in itself as large
as good-sized brick block of five stories.
The beautiful dome rises $50 feet. How
vast must be the surrounding palaces
when they are able to dwarf an immense
structure like this!
Turning your eye now toward the lake
the golden statue of the Republic is the
most striking object in view. 1t is beauti-
full, but does not seem very large. Ap-
proach it, and it appears to grow n foot
taller with every step you take. When
half way down the basin you see what you
hitherto failed to notice; n workman is
perched upon the head of the giant god
dess, regilding bit of her wreath There
is plenty of room for him within the cir
clet and when he permits his leg to dam
gle over the golden forehead his foot does
not reach her eyebrowsi
So it is with the other statuary. On one
side of the great basin, looking across at
the Agricultural palace, are pair of CO
lossal horses. You probably would not
notice their immense size if couple of
painters did not come up, and while one
puts a ladder against the animals body
and climbs via it to his back, another
stands under the huge trunk with room to
spare. Colossal buildings require colossal
statuary, and the Chicago people who
have pushed this work and shouldered the
burden and the responsibility found it re-
quired n thick and fast-running stream of
golden dollars to carry it through. The
fair is just twice Us big as they started out
to make it, and instead of costing them
ten millions of money it has cost them
twenty millions.
Figures sometimes fail to express vast
ness, but twenty millions of dollars may
be understood. Compare this sum with
the cost Of the finest public or private
building In your section of the country
Add to this such summaries as two thou
sand policemen to guard the hundred and
fifty millions of treasure here gathered
and on which fifty millions of insurance is
carried, three thousand employees of the
restaurants which are to feed the people,
fifteen hundred young men to wheel visitors
about in rolling-chairs, and you begin to
realize the enormous proportions Of the
Columbian exposition
But the only true way to realize its big
ness-and its beauty as WELLS to see it
for yourself. WALTER WEIIMAN.