ed he would take it for a
dignified silence that wouldn't dain to argy.

Well, we had our lunch in a box and a bottle of cold tea, and we eat it,
and rested quite a spell, Josiah's good nater returnin' with every
mouthful he took, till by the time we got ready to start out agin, he
wuz as clever a critter as I want to see.

I wanted to tackle the Palace of Arts next, as it wuz quite nigh by
considerin'. The Fair grounds are so immense that you have to travel
quite a distance to git anywhere. But Josiah said he wanted to see
sunthin' that wuz of practical use, ondervaluin' beauty, the great
Power, as some do. He wanted to see sunthin' solid, such as mines and
metals. And of course Blandina jined in with him, and though that is
what I wanted of her, as second chaperone, it provoked me time and agin;
queer, hain't it?

So as that too wuz quite nigh by, we went to the Palace of Mines and
Metals. It wuz a beautiful buildin', the walls covered with ornamental
carvin' and ornaments, and two tall pillars standin' up each side of the
entrance as if they wuz two Genis jealously guardin' the Under World
from intrusion. But we got by 'em. And what didn't we see there?
Everything that wuz ever dug out of the earth, and the way it wuz
discovered, mined and made useful to man.

Gems, precious stuns, granite, marble and all the processes for cutting
and polishing. Minerals of all kinds, natural mineral paints and
fertilizers, cement, luminants and waters. Asbestos, mica, coal, coal
oil and all the machinery for refining and storing it. Displays for
natural gas, petroleum; everything relating to lighting mines; safety
lamps; oils; electricity; acetyline. Most interestin' display in
geology; all kinds of rocks; crystal; clay; ores; nickel and all the
metals for making iron and steel and makin' 'em right there before you.
Explosives used in the Under World. Everything relating to the workin'
of salt mines; oil wells; metals, photographs; maps, illustrating how
these riches of the earth wuz deposited, and all the machinery for
collecting and making them useful to man.

And there wuz a place where we could see a miner's cabin, and miners at
work, blasting, draining, driving tunnels, drilling, traveling
underground. A gold mill; a New Mexican turquoise mine; a lead, zinc and
copper mine, all working there before us; and a coal mine discovered
there on the Exposition grounds, an underground railway connected these
two mines. And all sor