The Jewel City | Page 9

Horticulture in the architectural plan of the South Gardens. (p. 29.) It,
too, is French in style, its architecture suggested by the Theatre des
Beaux Arts in Paris, a design which furnished the dome necessary to
harmonize with that of the palace to the west. As architecture, however,
it fails to hold up its end with the splendid Horticultural Palace. Its
dome is too large, and has too little structure around it, to be placed so
near the ground without an effect of squattiness. Its festive adornment
is extremely moderate. On the cornice above the main entrance is the
rhyton, the ancient Greek drinking horn, symbol of festivity.
The sculpture, all done by Sherry E. Fry, carries out the same idea. The
graceful figures poised on the corner domes are Torch Bearers. On the
pylons at either end of the semicircular arcade of the main entrance are
two reclining figures. On the right is Bacchus, with his grapes and
wineskin,--a magnificently "pickled" Bacchus! On the left a woman is
listening to the strains of festal music. (p. 32.) Each of the pedestals
before the false windows at the ends of the arcade supports a figure of
Flora with garlands of flowers. On the ground below the two Floras are
two of the most delightful pieces of all the Exposition sculpture. One is
a little Pan, pipes in hand, sitting on a skin spread over an Ionic capital.
This is a real boy, crouching to watch the lizard that has crawled out
from beneath the stone. The other is a young girl dreaming the dreams
of childhood. There is something essentially girlish about this.
Unfortunately, it is now almost hidden by shrubbery.
Within Festival Hall is one of the half-dozen greatest organs in the

world. It has more than 7,000 pipes. The heaviest of them weigh as
much as 1,200 pounds apiece. Though mere size is not the essential
quality of a fine instrument, it is hard to ignore the real immensity of
this. The echo organ alone is larger than most pipe organs. This
complementary instrument, which is played from the console of the
main organ, is placed under the roof of the hall, above the center of the
ceiling. Its tones, floating down through the apertures in the dome, echo
the themes of the great organ.
Few organs have so mighty a note as the sixty-four-foot open pitch
attainable on the Exposition's instrument. Speaking by itself, this note
has no sound. It is only a tremendous quaking of the whole building, as
though the earth were shuddering. By itself it has no place in organ
music. It is not intended to be struck alone. It is used only as a
foundation upon which to build other tones. In combination it adds
majesty to the music, rumbling in a gigantic undertone to the lighter
notes.
Even the open stops in this organ are of more than ordinary dimensions.
The usual limit in a pipe organ is the sixteen-foot open stop. But in this
organ there are several pipes, both of wood and of metal, thirty-two feet
or more in length.
Two small buildings, balanced on either side of the Scott-street
entrance, are the Press Building and the Exposition home of the
National Young Women's Christian Association. They are alike, French
in style, and fronted with caryatid porches.
The real glory of the South Gardens lies in their flowers, and in the
charming setting the landscape engineers have here given to the south
facade of the palace group. There is the air of Versailles in the planned
gayety of the scene. In this the pools and fountains, the formal gardens,
the massed trees and shrubbery, and the two palaces themselves, play
their part.

IV.
"The Walled City": It's Great Palaces and their Architecture, Color and
Material

The central group of Exposition structures really a single vast palace,

behind a rampart--Historical fitness of such architecture here--The
south facade--Spanish portals of Varied Industries and Education
Palaces--Italian Renaissance portals of Manufactures and Liberal Arts,
and of the Courts of Flowers and Palms--The Roman west wall--Ornate
doorway of north facade Interior courts and aisles--A balanced plan--
This the first exposition to adopt the colors of nature for its
structures--Jules Guerin's color scheme, designed for an artificial
travertine marble--Simplicity of his palette, from which he painted the
entire Exposition--Even the flowers and sanded walks conform.

Although there are eight buildings named in the central palace group,
these are so closely connected in design and structure that in reality
they make but one palace. Here is seen the unity with variety which
marks this Exposition above all others. Commemorating a great
international event, its architecture is purposely eclectic, cosmopolitan.
Under a dominating Moorish-Spanish general form, the single architect
of the group, W. B. Faville, of San