Repository: UIHistories Project: Illio - 1895 [PAGE 58]

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By C. W. O U P P O S E that on the Fourth of last July, or w on Chicago Day, or on any other day of the Exposition, after it had once fairly begun, some capricious fairy had banished with one wave of her magic wand, our University from the Fair; suppose, I say, that the University of Illinois,* with all that it was and had been to the Fair, with all that it was doing and had done to help the Fair fulfill the purposes for which it was begun, had been blotted out in a single moment,' what would the result have been? Did you ever stop to think of it? Would the tenor of the Fair have been altered and its progress retarded? Would all the people there have noticed that something had happened? T h a t some strange and awful catastrophe had visited that beautiful wonderland? Or would the human tide have ebbed and flowed as usual, unmindful of any change? The Fair itself have continued on unimpaired, just as perfect and just as attractive as before? and the only notice of the event have been a paragraph in next morning's paper to the effect 44 that the very commendable exhibit of Champaign College" had disappeared in some mysterious and

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wholly unaccountable manner; that a dozen, or so, uniforms of the Columbian Guard had been found without occupants, and a few roller-chairs were lacking in motive power? Would this have been the whole result if our Alma Mater, with all her influences had vanished in a twinkling from the fully completed Fair? No, I think not. It would have been something more than this. Yes, vastly more. We have taken a very considerable satisfaction, during the past few months, in the character and extent of our University's exhibit at the Exposition, and, certainly our pride therein has not been mere vanity, but a very worthy and justifiable pride. For an exhibit occupying nearly a quarter of an acre of floor space and an indefinite amount of up-and-down space, of well-selected and handsomely arranged materials is, indeed something to be proud of, even tho* we did not know that it were many times greater than the exhibit of any other educational institution in the world. It was, in fact, a small exposition in itself. There were, besides the University headquarters!

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