Daily Texarkana Democrat., 1893-10-02
A BEAUTIFUL TRIBUTE
Paid to the Wonders Of the "White
City" A Poem in Prose.

oity." A Poem in Prose.
One OF the most beautiful, and we
might almost add sublime, tributes
yet paid to the inventive genius of
Nineteenth Century America, is that
which was inspired in the breast of
Charles Dudly Warner by the Won
ders of the "Whlte City," during a re-
cent visit to the Worlds Fair. The
great writer excels himself in the fol-
lowing piece of descriptive eloquence,
as vivid as it is touching and beauti-
full:
To the loiterer in the City of the
Lagoon at Chicago at twilight there
came a profound feeling of sadness.
1t was the touch of melancholy that
exquisite beauty is apt to induce when
it is felt to be transitory or when it is
a Renaissance ofhistoric splendor. 1t
was moment of repose. The Court
Of Honor was not wholly deserted.
Stray figures moved about, but with
the air of leisure and contemplation.
The crowd was elsewhere, in the Mid
way Plaisance, at the restaurants, and
presently it would return, refreshed
and eager for the great night display.
In the fading light the city seemed
more than ever only an enchanted city.
Through the long rows OF white col
umns of the Peristyl the lake cleaned
blue, and there was pink hue in the
west that flushed the domes and tow
ers and the white figures relieved
against the delicate sky. Even the
fountains were silent, and the golden
gigantic statute of Columbus seemed
to emphasize the impressive stiffness |
Of the hour. Presently the lines of |
electric light would run along the
cornices of the white palaces and along |
the waters edge, and the dome would
be afiame. Presently the fountain of
the ship and the sea horse would leap
up and overflow with loud, murmur-
Gus sound, and the flashing electric
would begin their fantastic
and unreal display, thrusting up into
the night ever-changing shapes of
beauty, with exquisite colors shifting
each moment, mingling, passing, fad
ng, Frightening, grace of form and
charm of color uniting to move the
spectator as he was never moved be-
tore by any earthly vision. But now
Il was the hour of stiffness and of SEN
.iment akin to melancholy. And
when this silence was almost painful
,ame the soft chime of bells from the
.ower of Machinery Hall, floating over
he city and out upon the water, tones
n harmony with the scene and yet
of traditionary glory. 1t
10 easily might be a requiem for pass
ng splendor, like the sound of bells
,ver the towers and spires of the city
hat DE Quincy saw at the bottom of
he sea.
Was it real? The spectator look
I'd about, up the canals spanned by
bridges and flanked by white facades,
1t the lofty towers, upon the monu-
mental columns that made the gate
way Of the sea, in nervous appre-
lension of the transformers of it all
Every night he had feared that he
should see 1t no more, and every
he had fastened to
reassure himself that the creation
had not disappeared. And the
chimes dropping soft sounds seemed
more than ever to have the note of
Perhaps the traveller had
seen pictures of the ruins of Persepo-
lis, of the lonely marble columns in
the desert of Palmyra; perhaps he had
heard the lament of the sea, as Byron
heard it along the broken wall of We
nice; perhaps he had mused, as Glib
bon unused, in the Church of Ara
Cgli amid the fallen splendors of
great Rome, Perhaps these pictures
came to his mind with an overwhelm-
ming sense of the transformers of
life at the moment when life seemed
to reach summit in the experience
of beauty. And he knew that 1t
would not last--that In q few more
weeks of splendor, days of excitement
and nights of enchantment, it would
all vanish as if it had never been;
the chimes would cease, the lagoon
would return to its solitude, and the
white columns would be no longer re-
flected in the waves on the Michigan
shore.
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