The Adventures of Uncle Jeremiah and Family at the Great Fair Part 8

She sank upon a chair and gazed stupefied for some minutes at the awful scene. Then as they pa.s.sed on she said, "I have seen the wonderful machinery great and small. I have seen the old relics which they say are the remains of men's hopes long gone by, but when man can take the light that comes out from the storms and put it up for show, it seems to me that I am seeing forbidden things and that the skill of men has gone too far."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The light shot across the sky."]

At the next flash from the tower there was a shriek and a crowd began to gather about a man just across the hall. The cry came from a man who could receive the terrible grandeur but he did not have the strength of mind to sustain it.

He was gazing upon the incandescent globe-studded column, as in a trance, and again one of the electricians turned on the current and the shaft changed to living fire. The man seemed horrified by the unearthly beauty of the spectacle. It continued but a minute, when the current was turned off and the blinding light disappeared almost as suddenly as it had come.

A bystander whose attention happened to be directed toward him says that he stood gazing at the column for fully three minutes after the light had been turned off and that his countenance betrayed overwhelming bewilderment. Once or twice he raised a hand and drew it across his forehead. Then he was seen to press his temples with both palms, all the while gazing in an awe-stricken way at the great pillar. The attention of several visitors was attracted to the farmer, and one of them stepped to his side to inquire if anything was wrong with him. As the gentleman reached his side the latter threw his arms upward and, with a shriek that started the echoes, fell forward upon his face. Two or three guards rushed to the prostrate man's a.s.sistance, but before they reached his side he leaped to his feet and, screaming at the top of his voice, ran through the aisle toward the entrance facing the lagoon.

In a moment all was excitement, and the great crowd of visitors, becoming panic-stricken, ran in a dozen different directions or hid behind exhibits. The madman, pursued by a half-dozen guards, dashed down a side aisle and, leaping over boxes and machines, made a complete circuit of the General Electric company's exhibit and then paused again before the central column. Two guards seized him, but he threw them off as though they had been infants and again he started on a wild hurdle race through the building. He had not gone far when he tripped and fell, and in a moment three bluecoats were upon him.

Struggling and shrieking, the poor man was half led, half carried, to the north entrance of the building, where was waiting a patrol wagon. It required the combined strength of five guards to get the unfortunate man into the patrol wagon. Throughout the short drive to the patrol barn the prisoner fought like a wild animal and the officers had their hands full in keeping him aboard. When brought before the sergeant the prisoner became exceedingly quiet and spoke rationally while giving his name and address.

One of the guards then began to detail the offense of the prisoner. The recital had but just begun when the man became greatly excited and began screaming once more. The sergeant placed his hand in a kindly way upon his shoulder and gently forced him into a chair. The man grew quiet again and listened to the guard relate the story of the arrest without interruption. When the officer had finished the man arose and, walking up to the sergeant, said:

"Don't harm me, I didn't put all those bottles there. I'll tell you how it was. Somebody has stuck those bottles on that post and covered them up with a white cloth. When they raised the cloth the bottles turned to fire. I am not to blame. I don't know how those bottles came there.

There are millions of them. They were all right at first, but the devils poured red fire into them. Don't hurt me. I had nothing to do with it."

The sergeant talked kindly to the man, and when he was quieted led him to the hospital, where a doctor attended to him. Here he entered into a long description of the pillar of "bottles," by which he evidently meant the incandescent globes. The doctor gave his patient a quieting potion, and in a short time he fell into a sleep. When he awoke from his sleep he was quiet, but his mind still dwelt on the pillar of "bottles," and he insisted on repeating his version of the affair to all the doctors.

In the evening a carriage took the patient away, supposedly to the detention hospital.

_CHAPTER VII_

ON BOARD THE "ILLINOIS"

"Now for the battleship," said Johnny, "that's what I want to see." As they came on board the brick ship, the first words they heard were quite nautical.

"It's eight bells."

"Aye, aye, sir!"

The bos'un, or whoever it was that received the order from the Lieutenant, climbed up and tapped out eight strokes on the big bra.s.s bell. About twenty people, with lunch baskets and camp-chairs, ran after him and watched the performance.

"What's that for?" asked a young woman.

"That tells the time of day," answered her escort.

"But it's after 12 o'clock by my watch and he struck it only eight times."

"Well, they--ah--they have a system of their own. It's very complicated."

"Look at that crooked thing there," said one of the visitors, pointing to the air-tube leading to the stoker. "Is that their foghorn I've heerd about?"

"They don't need no foghorns on warships. I jedge it's a shootin'-iron of some kind or other, maybe a gattlin' gun what jest blows the shot out. You see it's pointin' out like at an enemy."

An elderly woman stepped up to the Lieutenant and said: "I'd like mighty well to see some of the Gatling guns."

"Yes, ma'am, you will find them at the foretop."

"How's that?"

"At the turret in the fore-top."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "MAYBE ITS A FOG HORN, OR A GATLING GUN."]

"Do you mean up in the little round cupola?"

"Cupola, great heavens," murmured the officer under his breath. Then he called a marine and had him show the woman to the fore-top. It is the experience of a lifetime for a naval officer who has cruised in the Mediterranean and rocked over the high waves of the south Atlantic to be placed in command of a brick battleship, which rests peacefully alongside a little pier and is boarded by hundreds of reckless sight-seers every day. The conning towers are of sheet-iron and some of the formidable guns are simply painted wood. It is said that if anything larger than a six-inch gun should be fired from the deck of the mimic battleship the recoil would upset the masonry and jolt the whole structure into a shapeless ma.s.s.

Below the water line the Illinois is a hollow mockery, but the two decks, the turrets and the heavy battery are made so realistic that any one who had not seen the brick laid and the plating put on might suppose it was a real war vessel that had stranded well in toward the beach. As a matter of fact, about one-third of the visitors are deceived, which fact may be vouched for by any one of the marines parading the deck. A man who looked as though he read the newspapers, called a sergeant of marines "Cap," and remarked that it was a very fine vessel.

"Yes, indeed, sir," replied the sergeant.

"She'll be here all summer, will she?"

"Oh, yes."

"Did this boat take part in the review at New York?"

"No, sir; this battleship is stuck fast here. It is a sh.e.l.l of brick, built up from a stone foundation, and is intended to represent a model battleship."

"You don't tell me. Made of brick, eh?" Uncle, listening to the talk, shared the countryman's disgust.

"There, f.a.n.n.y, how do you excuse them for that piece of mockery?

Everybody getting fooled as if they were in a cheap dime show. It's too bad the government should be a partner to sich deceptions. And then just hear them fellows making fun o' the likes o' us. It's a shame. Of course we hev to ask questions when they use all the art in the world to make deceiving things and then make fun if they do such good work as to fool us. We don't know any more about their work than they do about our farm. I guess they couldn't tell a Jersey from a short-horn, nor a header from a clover-huller."

One of the sailors was telling of the questions asked by the public.

Some person asked him if the gulls flying around the ship were sea-gulls, and whether they had been brought on especially for the Fair.

Another asked why the guns were plugged up at the end with pieces of wood. A marine said the plugs of wood made them air-tight, so that they wouldn't sink if they fell overboard. Maybe the man believed it. He didn't say anything.

From sight-seeing at the ship they came over to the Fisheries building.

The throng of visitors here at first detracted their sight from the wall of fish and wonders of the sea around them.

"Oh," said Aunt when she looked about, "I nearly have to gasp to make sure I'm not at the bottom of the sea. Just look at them fish swimming around on both sides of you."

"Well I feel sorry for these poor fish, they look so tired," said f.a.n.n.y, "but it's very evident they can't keep lively all the time."

One of the big scaly-backed tarpons in the fountain was fanning his tail and moving slowly through the water. On the railing at the edge of the pool sat a tired man with a baby hanging over his arm. If the tarpon had stuck his nose out of the water he could have grabbed the man by the coat-tail and pulled him backward. The mother was standing a few feet away. She turned around and saw two beady eyes shining up through the water.

"Hold tight to that child," she said. "If you ever drop him that big pike would gobble him right up."

"He don't eat babies," replied the husband, calmly. "Besides, it ain't a pike; it's a sturgeon."

"Well, he looks awful mean, anyway." The husband, merely to rea.s.sure her, moved a few feet further along and let the baby lie over his shoulder and watch the little fish chase one another. The aisles were crowded full of people, who had found that a visit to the east end of the Fisheries building was almost as good as a dive to the bottom of the ocean.