turn and return like graceful automata, silent and queenly, wearing on their impersonal shoulders the incomparable creations of world-famous artists in dress.

West of the Opéra the boulevard assumes a more cosmopolitan air, thanks to the neighborhood of the Café de la Paix and the Grand Hôtel, those great caravansaries of visitors from all quarters of the globe. At the little tables in front of this café may be seen specimens of all the nationalities of the earth-Chinese, Japanese, Turks with fezes, Arabs enveloped in voluminous burnooses, Germans with blond hair, Brazilians with yellow skins and flaming eyes, Englishmen smoking pipes and wearing absurd caps; while at the dinner and supper hours the restaurant is crowded with high-livers of both sexes, whose chief occupation is to spend money in places of reputed luxury. At the Café de la Paix may be seen the most magnificent and gorgeously arrayed rastacouères on the face of the earth, and by rastacouères we mean exotic people whose looks, dress, manners, and wealth are ostentatious and excessive, and whose every act and gesture is wanting in measure and tact. The characteristics of Parisian elegance, on the contrary, are measure, tact, taste, and self-possession. The beautiful French women whom you see in Paris, whether in the streets, in the restaurants, in the afternoon drive in the Bois, in the salons, or at the opera, however striking their appearance may be, and however grand the effort of elegance, never look as if they were "out," to use a familiar phrase, or as if they had " got 'em all on," to use another vulgar but luminous expression. And the reason of this pleasing phenomenon is, I imagine, that the French, as Heine tells us, are admirable comedians, and each one plays excellently the rôle that he or she has assumed in the spectacle of the life of Paris.

Another delightful part of the boulevard, and, from the point of view of urban landscape, the most brilliant, is the Place de la Madeleine, with its two quiet corners where the fountains play and the trees give grateful shade to those who sit beneath them and dream of fairer fortunes. At one corner is Durand's, and at the other Larue's, both favorite restaurants with the worldlings. From Durand's corner the view embraces the classic columns of the Church of the Made

leine, the magnificent avenue of the Boulevard Malesherbes, with the dome of the Church of St. Augustin closing the perspective, and, to the left, the broad Rue Royale and the vast Place de la Concorde. By day and by night the spectacle here is always interesting. There is no better coin of vantage for studying character and comparative elegance than one of the little tables outside Durand's, and there is no spot along the boulevard where the combined effects of nature and of art, of moonlight on architecture and verdure, of electric light and gas upon white façades and passing carriages, can be better observed than this broad and open space with its canopy of blue sky.

In foul weather as in fair the variety persists, and there is no more curious picture for a painter to essay than the Place de l'Opéra on a pitilessly rainy night, with the cavalrymen of the regiment of the Gardes de Paris sitting on their horsesuseless sentries in front of the Operahouse-the movement of the cabs depositing the visitors at the foot of the perron, the voyous or street arabs who run to open the carriage doors, the hurrying up the steps amid battling umbrellas, and the pelting rain splashing on the pavement.

On the boulevard, with its newspapers, its book stores, its theatres, its cafés, its politicians, its financiers, its wits, its celebrities, its adventurers, and all the kaleidoscopic movement of men and things that animate it from morning until morning comes again, one appreciates that quality of modernity which characterizes Paris above all other cities. In other capitals where the fortunes of a nomad existence and a moderate gift of tongues have enabled me to live and comprehend the local life, I have never found anything equivalent to the life of the boulevard, which is the quintessence of the life of Paris. For the peculiarity of Paris is that it is being constantly renewed; it is not oppressed by history or hampered by an obtrusive past. There is an old Paris, it is true; one sees it and loves it; but it is so discreet that one has to seek it out. The present alone predominates. The vapory regions of souvenir and of presentiment are not willingly frequented by those who speak the French of Paris and who live in the brilliant sunshine of living Paris a life of intensity and ardor, here and now, upon the principle that life is the end of life.

SOLDIER once attempted to describe to me an assault on a large redoubt, now famous as one of the most notable dramatic events in an active campaign. His story was graphic and impressive, because it was from the simple point of view of the actors in the drama, and contained none of the broader generalizations and theories of military science which characterized the official account of the battle. He told, among other things, how he and his comrades dodged from the little turnpike-house on the highway into the shelter of a low haystack, and thence dashed across the open and tumbled breathless into the ditch of the redoubt; how they held their position there in spite of grenades and other less dangerous missiles until the ditch was full of men eager for the assault; how at

last, with no word of command, and without any definite consciousness of concerted action, they swarmed up the steep wall of earth, and had the enemy on the run before he knew where he was. "How is it possible," I asked, "for you all to have made the attack at the same moment without some signal or command? Was there no bugle call, or no word passed along?" "No," he replied; "there was no bugler there, and no officer higher than a captain. We went ahead at the right moment because we all felt like it, and knew it was the right thing to do." The soldier was no little of a philosopher in his way, and elaborated his last remark into a crude but convincing disquisition on the spirit which animates a successful army. "War is like a great football game," he said; "it has its accidents and

its set-backs, but when your blood is up you don't think of anything but action. It is the enthusiasm that counts. No one knows where it comes from, and it is as contagious as the measles. Of course the officers have a great deal to do with it, and the general is everything. We don't see him much, but we feel him always. We did the other day at the redoubt. I know I heard him saying, 'Now is the time, boys!' and he wasn't anywhere within a mile of us. The other fellows must have heard it too, or they wouldn't have started. Don't smile, now, for it's true; I did hear it, although I didn't tell you so at first." The soldier was stating the terms of no new theory, was enunciating no novel problem of psychology, but was simply and honestly relating what had happened to him and his comrades, and how they felt. Without knowing it, he had struck the key-note of all great human undertakings, and in the same way that certain objects give back an echo of the vibration of a

FREDERICK LAW OLMSTED (F. L. OLMSTED & CO.). Landscape Architect.

string to which they are sympathetically attuned, so did the impulses of his honest soul move in harmony with the pulsations of the enveloping, absorbing, and directing spirit of the great game in which he took an active though comparatively unimportant part.

The parallel between a campaign and the peaceful enterprise now in active operation in Chicago may be a trite one, but it is none the less just. The elements of both are closely related, although they are not in every respect similar. But the spirit is identical, and the mental and physical characteristics developed and the qualities of manhood demanded are precisely the same in both cases. Through the roar of the midnight storm and in the stillness of the placid moonlight. the rattle of chains, the throb of engines, the hiss of steam, and the monotonous tramp of the guards are everywhere heard in

RICHARD M. HUNT. Architect of the Administration Building.

the enclosure, now the centre of the greatest activity in the world. With the first dawn of day, before the ruddy summer sun rises out of the faint horizon of Lake Michigan, converging lines of hurrying men blacken every thoroughfare in the vicinity of the park, and as the first hours of daylight pass, each noisy train along the adjacent railway pours into the gates of the exposition hundreds of clerks, mechanics, and laborers. Every one hastens to his work. Listen to their earnest conversation. It is always about their task. One deplores the delay in getting material; another criticises the necessary changes; a third is full of anxiety lest the heat or the threatening rain will put a stop to progress in his part of the work. They are all eager, preoccupied, enthusiastic. Take a walk around the grounds; study the actions of this busy hive, where no drones can live. The rattle, the din, the whirl, are at first confusing, and disorder seems to reign supreme. Watch the scene awhile and

you will find that these straggling carts all go straight to their appointed places, that these scattered gangs of workmen follow the mute signals of the foreman, and each man is intent on the work to which he is now accustomed. From the skilful pioneers of iron and carpentry work, running about with wonderful courage on the narrow girders of huge iron trusses a hundred yards in air, to the common spade laborers burrowing in the soft sand of the open spaces, there is not one who does not feel the intoxication of the enthusiasm, the stimulus of the restless energy, which are the life and soul of the undertaking. Now and then a squad of uniformed guards marches past with the precision of soldiers. Occasionally an ambulance bell is heard, and a pair of galloping horses, and a long wagon bearing policemen with a limp and possibly mutilated form on a stretcher between them, flash past, followed by curious, anxious looks, but cause no halt in the nervous activity along their path. And so the day goes on, with a brief half-hour for rest and food at noon. The mass of workmen swarm out of the gates when their eight hours' toil is over, but until the shadows of the night come on the sound of hammers still continues, and the creak of derricks is heard at points where conditions force the completion of the work.

Everybody remembers the history of the struggle which ended in the choice of Chicago as the proper place for the exposition of 1893, but few, now that the success of the fair is assured, will care to recall the spirit of antagonism this choice excited in various quarters, where now the former scoffers frankly confess and heartily defend their conversion. It would be unjust to say that Chicago has builded better than she knew, but it is proper to assert that she has accomplished much more and followed a higher standard of excellence than she herself would have been willing to guarantee before she had fairly tested her strength in an emergency. The world has become accustomed to the unparalleled strides in

material prosperity which have been so freely and loudly advertised as peculiar to Chicago alone; it may never have believed half of them, and certainly has not been too eager to condone the faults which, after all is said and done, are the result of the exuberant confidence of youth. When from time to time it has been noticed that the finest system of parks in the world has been growing to perfection in this city, that some of the noblest monuments of modern sculpture have been placed there, that many of the finest examples of ancient as well as modern art have found their way to the shores of the Great Lakes, and that universities, schools of art, museums, and other accompaniments of a high state of civilization have been established with very little flourish of trumpets, then the world has at last awakened to the suspicion that there may, after all, be a note of true melody in the discord and a spark

CHARLES B. ATWOOD. Designer-in-Chief, Architect of the Galleries of Fine Arts, etc.

CHARLES F. MOKIM (MOKIM, MEAD, & WHITE). Architect of the Agricultural Building.

The

of real fire in the smother. exposition will show not only what has been done, but what can be confidently predicted as the outcome of persistent and well-directed energy. All the descriptions in the world and the most faithful illustrations will give no idea of the great beauty and the grand proportions of the buildings, and the charm of the surroundings. The traveller who has felt the overpowering sense of worshipful admiration in the presence of one of the great temples of antiquity will appreciate how little the photographs or pictures can give a hint of the glories of the reality. So the visitor to Chicago, familiar as he may be with the plan and the dimensions of the buildings and their general aspect, has a new sensation when he passes the gates, is overwhelmed at once with the grandeur, the nobility, the charm of style, and the impressive aspect of the buildings, which his imagination, however vivid, has but feebly pictured to him. As he gazes, the impression grows,