The Progress., 1893-08-26
illinois GREAT DAY.
programme Of Her Celebration
at the Fair.
GRAND ILLUMINATION AT NIGHT

me an To BE Had in
'he Fisheries BuiIding-The Attendance
ON the Increase.
"oELD FAIR, Aug. 23 - Especial -
tomorrow Illinois will own the grounds
and that will be emphaticaIIv her dav
Ior IL the performance comes anyways
near the programme, it will by far exceed
that OF any other state dsv. At $50 q. N.
al the non-Aryan races will parade. from
fSqulmauX to Siamese, the great proces-
/ sion beginning with the (allegetD beauty
show and ending with the Bedouin riders
Next VIII come Buffalo Bills wild west
riders and miscellaneous troupe of COW
boys and Observation-Disclosures from the far
southwest, and then the gorgeous Britons
OF Tattersall's tournaments will traverse
the broad avenues showing military oyo-
Iutions as they proceed. Exactly at noon
the state guard, 800 strong, will pass in re-
view before Governor Altgeld and staff.
At2 p. m. his reception and the social
feature will begin, and at night the Grand
est illumination of the grounds down to
that time will be shown.
The state authorities put the attendance
for the day at 100000. They are extrava-
CANT of course, nut the crowd will I'M
uoubtedly be large, for the railroads have
made extremely favorable rates for ten
days and already one can notice great
increase. Indeed, the attendance has been
gaining rapidly for the past fortnight. 1t
Is quite appropriate that Illinois should
have the grandest display, for she is right
here, as 1t were. Indeed, little over one
half OF the states entire population lives
IN an area from any part of which the fare
at regular rates is dollar or less. Chi
cago, kOwever, declares her intention 10
beat tht state when her own day comes
and that will be on the twenty-second an
niversary of the great fire And all this
brings me to some "reminiscences on the
basis of the old "chestnut''-how great the,
changes in this country in one short life
time.
Thirty-seven years ago / crossed the
Wabash river on horseback and as one of
party of stock drivers Travelled across
east central Illinois. A little west of Dan
vile we struck the open prairie and for a
settled only along the streams and groves.
Almost every day we would journey for
hours without coming near house and
crossed many tracts seven or eight miles
wide where there was not a rod of fence or
sod turned. But even then Chicago was
wonder. People in that middle section
told MS the city contained some S0,0O0people
and had three theaters. Two years before
hcf ffrSt -,
entered the city. Now all that region to
which our folks drove their cattle for free
grazing is a blooming garden thick set
with cities and villages, a region criss-
crossed by wire and rail and dotted with
artificial groves, where from any COM
manding point one may see scores of
churches and school houses rising from "A
vast expanse of emerald meadow and way
ing grain. And for free pasture the stock
men must go 200 miles farther west.
e.
OF course some backwoods people are
still found even in Illinois and though
none of them have "blowed out the gas"
as that congressman of Texas did, they oc-
casionally do some queer things. All the
gossips are laughing at an old gentleman
who entered the grounds at the Fifty
eighth street gate the other day, with his
wife and five children, and confidentially
informed the first man he saw that he and
his folks were going to see all there is to
see if it took every cent he had. The party
turned sharply to the right, passed around
the little wooden building there and were
attracted by the exit gate, turnstile with
many arms. Lets see what's in here
first" said the old man. So the whole
family pushed through the turnstile and
to their amazement and dismay found
themselves out in the street. 1t only cost
them 81. IS to get in again as three of the
children were young.
For genuine fun the great circular
building in which are the live fish is an
exception among the rooms. Everywhere
else decorous reserve is maintained, and
in The Fine Arts, Woman's building and
some others profound silence. But
among the fish all restraint is by common
consent laid aside. All the family parties
go there and all the children go wild with
delight. There is one great central tank
Civ en- up chiefly to marine monsters, and
around the walls succession of tanks, ali
these rising above the spectators head,
and the glass sides are so very clear and
transparent, the glass being without a
flaw, that it is Just the same as If one were
walking on the bottom of lake or ocean
while the inhabitants thereof move around
him. Everybody talks and laughs, every
body comments aloud with exchange of
jokes on the queer creatures, all the little
ones held up to see the big fish yell with
delight and there is a most enlivening
racket all around.
The back of the wall tanks is generally
built up in stone to represent the ocean
caves or rocky banks of lake or stream, as
is the central part Of the center tank.
There one may see the monster turtles
rolling in awkward gambols from the
rocks to the sandy bottom. There are the /
inhabitants of the deep sea grottoes in
thousands-the coral, the sea anemone,
devil fish, marine she'll fish, even the |
shark and the gymnotus, the aquaemtaur (
and the hippocampus. In one fresh water |
tank 16 feet long and rising almost to the I
roof are found perch of every variety /