The Tupelo journal., 1904-10-07
Vest-POcket Souvenirs
of the Worlds Fair

of the Worlds Fail
You have walked through crowds
past thousands OF faces and never
passed face that you know. Look
ing at California's orange-trim-
med villas filled with all sorts of
fruits you ever ate and other sorts
besides; at corn houses from
Missouri, grain palaces from Kan
sas, all sorts of cereal palaces, all
sorts of architectural triumphs in
grains, in hemp, in tobacco, IN
flour; at horses and elephants
and castles in raislns, in nuts, in
prunes; at horses and COWS, and
presidents faces in butter; at pyra-
mids and obellsks in wine; at all
of the rest, and all of them stran-
gers, Oh, for one face that you
know.
See down the aisle, the long
aisle of agriculture's walled-in
acres, isn't there a face that you
know? Why didn't somebody
tell youi Wasn't it better to come
upon him suddenly, unexpectedly,
this old, old friend of yours, this
friend, who, after fashion all his
own, has stood by you, as the
Chinese comet in an ancestral
sense, for a hundred and fifty
years? Not an ordinary individual
he, not to the common people does
he belong. He's monarch by
right of well, what shall | say'
By right of birth, of breedings
BY right of his seat on the throne !:
by right of that surely Are you
of blood royal, too, that you are
of his familiars? You will let that
question pass, but his is the face
of friend and his are the face
and form of king.
King Cotton Of the Southland,
clothed in long ermine like robes
of cotton seated on throne of
cotton, crownei with the feecy
stuff and holding out to you MS you
approach, sign of his royal favor,
his scepter great cotton bloom.
Will he give You "the half of his
kingdom" think you? At least
there is welcome waiting You
here at his friendly feet aud oh,
it is good to get here and feel thot
You know where you are
You've nothing to do but sit
here and be entertained firstly by
the furnishings of the king and
which of them are new sights t.,
you? There are bales of cotton
stuffs done up IN gorgeous red Sat
in, 10 blue satin, in satin of bridal
white and all with hoops of gold,
and you don't feel like sitting or
leaning Gu cotton-stuffed sofas like
these. But here at the back of the
throne is bank Of cotton packed
in something you know-the coarse
heavy blown bagging, with its iron
ties. Doesn't it look familiar, the
dusty, rusty mustv bale, bulging
and bursting with its 500 pounds
of Iints Steal chance when no
body is looking and give it as much
of hug as your arms will permit
Then here beside it is the tiny,
compressed bale, a 500 FOUNDER,
too, but in ship-shape now and
squeezed into mite of its big
self. Somehow you feel that 1t is
getting away from you and the
land that gave birth to it and to
you. The up-to-date round-lap
bale for which you never can feel
the proper respect. They look SO
spick and span, so dudlsh and
weigh just $50 pounds or there
abouts, aud what is that but a half
of bale as a dude is half of man?
Hampers and hand baskets of
seed cotton. a pile of cotton seed
the very pile cf cotton seed, only
not half as big, that you used to
think 1t such soft fun to roll in, to
hide in, to build your beautiful
houses. Lint cotton, carded cotton
spun cotton and whole showcase
of pretty cotton stripes, Cotton
seed just ginned, cotton seed de
Tinted, cot on seed hulls, cotton
seed oil cakes, cotton seed meal.
crude cotton seed oil and cotton
seed oil refined But best of all,
most homely of all here is cotton
in "croker sacks" swung to the
shoulders of a man, a woman, a
boy-all three of them fairly good
couuterfeits Of the people whose
shiny black faces appear at their
very best in an autumn field that
is white with cotton.
Only question of a few mo-