WHAT WE SAW AT THE PALACE OF FOOD PRODUCTS

DEAR COUSINS:

FRONTING on the Esplanade we found the Food Products Palace. Madame World considers that it is most important that the Spirit of Plenty, who rules food production, should have a palace worthy of her august Highness.

They were cooking so many things, and showing such quantities of food that it was most surprising. We were offered almost everything to eat that we had ever heard of, and some that we did not know existed. We were willing to sample them all, but father said that he did not believe we had better try to eat in so many languages. So we just had an oatmeal scone, and some puffed rice, and some Chinese cookies, a cup of chocolate, and a bit of biscuit, and a few other little things, but the others all looked good.

A lady has the most fascinating display of flowers made out of butter, red roses, and yellow roses, and water-lilies, and tulips, all growing on a lattice work inside her refrigerator. The colored flowers may be eaten because it is all colored with pure food colors. You could not tell that the flowers were not real, they look as though they grew there. She must have a lovely soul.

We wandered around to see the Aquarium. The fishes are lovely; we wish they did not have to be called Food Products. The Shovel-nosed Sturgeon is very probably a cousin to old Mr. Alligator, because he looks like him. He has the same bony humps on his back, and his head is shaped almost the same.

The Gar Pike looks like a submarine, and holds his body very rigidly, swimming only with his fins. He is grey and looks very cool and calm.

In one pool with some big blue Catfishes were some Salamanders, with funny furry tufts on their heads. They were lazy and would not get up. They resemble lizards. There was a whole tank of lovely Golden Perch from Catalina. They have faces with real foreheads, and a very bored and haughty expression. There were also some lovely Rainbow Trout from Canada’s mountain streams.

We were much interested in the fish-hatching processes. The eggs are kept under running water on a sort of griddle or coarse net, and when one little wiggly fellow comes out he uncoils and is long instead of round as he was in the egg, and so he drops down into the bottom of the tank, and begins to be a fish. He carries the rest of the egg around with him for a few days so that he need not be hungry until he has absorbed the nutrition it gives him.

Fishes do not care much about their relations except for dinner, as they are real cannibals. I suppose they do not know any better, but it seems unfortunate. I fear we neglected the rest of the palace.

Your loving cousins, JANE AND ELLEN.

DEAR COUSINS:

WE WENT around through the Court of the Universe, and across the Aisle of the Setting Sun to the Palace of Agriculture, which is very beautiful indeed.

We suppose that Madame World wished to do all the honor possible to the Goddess of Agriculture, as she is a most useful goddess, and the world could not do without her, because she has to furnish food for all the earth.

We get used to taking things very much for granted, and do not seem to be interested in where things come from, and so that is why such a Fair as this is useful. It lets us know to whom we are indebted for the things we eat. Iowa had a real mountain of corn, lovely golden corn, and Vermont had real maple sugar to eat on the Johnnie cake the corn would make.

North Carolina and South Carolina send us rice, and Cuba sends us coffee, and South America sends fruits and also coffee, China sends tea and preserved ginger and funny nuts, and California and Florida give us oranges and grapefruit and strawberries, and almost everything good to eat, and the Philippines send us cocoanuts and Hawaii sends pineapples. Did you know that peanuts grow on a vine in the ground, and that bananas do not grow on a tree but on a tall ferny-looking thing which is not a tree, and pineapples grow on short plants which are set out every year? It takes a long time for the pineapple to perfect itself, but we did not learn just how long.

A gentleman from Cuba showed us a collection of fruit which is grown in that island, including the avocado, or alligator pear. It is a very wonderful fruit, and there is a tree in Southern California which is insured for thirty thousand dollars.

But the big red apples from Oregon were of more interest to us, because we know that we like those, and do not have to take any risks. And the lovely juicy golden oranges of California are good enough for us. But we liked to see all the things that have grown from the ground, because we can never quite understand the marvel of it—how a little seed knows quite well what it is going to be when it comes up. We know, because we planted some lettuce one year and it came up turnips. It said lettuce on the paper, but the seeds knew all the time that they were no such thing.

We could not be deceived like that again, because we know the difference now between lettuce and turnip seed.

We asked father if he did not think that Madame World should be very proud of her children, and he said yes, he did think so, and also that it was a great privilege to belong to her.

Father says such wise things!

Your loving cousins, JANE AND ELLEN.