THE COURT OF THE UNIVERSE

DEAR COUSINS:

WHILE we were in the Court of the Universe, father thought we had better have another lesson on sculpture.

He considers that the fountains of The Rising Sun and Descending Night are the very finest things at the Fair, and he has traveled abroad and is a good judge. They are the work of Adolph A. Weinman. Father wants us to put in the names of sculptors and artists not because he expects us to remember them just now, but because big brother will want to know.

The very big groups on the triumphal arches attracted our attention, and we asked about them and what they were supposed to mean. Everything about the Fair has some meaning, but we do not expect to get it all. The group with the elephant and the Oriental gentlemen represents Eastern civilization on the way to meet Western civilization, which is represented by the group on the other arch—that with the prairie schooner drawn by oxen, and the figure of the Alaskan woman.

The Spirit of the East marching to meet The Spirit of the West is meant to typify the meeting of the world’s families now that the Canal has been completed.

The groups are the work of A. Stirling Calder, Leo Lentelli, and Frederick G. R. Roth.

Father liked very much the “Hopes of the Future” and “The Mother of Tomorrow,” two of Mr. Calder’s best things, in the group.

We liked, especially after the lights were on, the figures representing stars, of which so many are used in the avenue leading north.

Mr. Robert I. Aitken has four good figures in this court, and in the evening when the lights were on and the vapor was rising from the urns it looked like a story out of the Arabian Nights.

The flowers are lovely, and you never for a moment feel away from home, because all the courts are so homey-feeling, just like one’s own garden.

Father said after awhile that he thought it would be well for us to see something that we could really understand, and so he took us over to see Edith Woodman Burroughs’ dear little figure of “Youth” which she has made for a fountain. We just loved it, it looks so girly, and we were also much interested in the Fountain of Eldorado by Mrs. Whitney, because we have read the story about Ponce de Leon.

It would be nice to be a sculptor if one were a boy, unless one could be an aviator.

Your loving cousins, JANE AND ELLEN.

DEAR COUSINS:

WE ARE very happy and cheerful children—we have often heard people say so—but behind our smiling faces lies the deep and consuming sorrow that we have not a brother of our own age.

We can never understand why kind Providence did not create us triplets instead of twins and make one-third of us boy! It would have made no difference to kind Providence, and would have been much better for us.

We have never needed a brother as much as we do in seeing this Fair, though of course we say nothing to father about it as we realize that he is doing his best for us, but he so often has to leave us while he attends to some business or other, and then it is we feel the need of a brother of our own age. An older one would be of no use, as our fifteen-year-old one is not any good to us. He says he has interests of his own.

We were waiting in the Court of Abundance today for father, and were having a lovely time pretending that the lanterns between the arches were the homes of the light fairies, which would come out after the sun went away, and waving their golden wands would say, “Let there be light,” and there would be light, and that the color fairies would come down from the pictures and dance with the light fairies, and goodness only knows what we might not have accomplished in the way of a six best seller when a young sparrow fell out of his nest. He was disturbed about it, very naturally, but we were so sorry for him that we could not go on with our pretend. If we had had a brother of course he could have climbed up and put the poor little thing back, but a guard came and got him, and while of course we shall never know what happened, we have our fears.

Father came just then and we asked him if he wanted to give us a lesson, and he remarked that he feared the Court of Abundance was almost too big for a couple of ten-year-old tots to get much out of except perhaps fresh air and incipient inspiration. That cannot be as serious as it sounds, because we are sure father would not expose us to anything, but we shall look up “incipient” as soon as we get home.

We stayed down and saw the lights this evening and when the vapor is rising from the urns and the serpents are writhing, or at least seeming to, and all the lanterns are lighted, it looks like something out of our Arabian Nights’ book.

We shall try to finish our little play sometime, when the sparrows have taught their young ones to fly properly.

Your loving cousins, JANE AND ELLEN.

Night Illumination—Niche in the Court of the Four Seasons.