Chicago, the Wondrous, sits amid her wealth, like a magnificent sultana, half-reclining over a great oval mirror, supplied by that lake of lakes, the fathomless Michigan.  Perhaps the resemblance might be unpoetically traced to particulars; for we are told by lotos-eating travellers, that Oriental beauties, with all their splendor, are not especially clean.  Certain it is that our Occidental sultana dresses her fair head with towers and spires, and hangs about her neck long rows of gems in the shape of stately and elegant dwellings,—­yet, descending to her feet, we sink in mud and mire, or tumble unguardedly into excavations set like traps for the unwary, or oust whole colonies of rats from beneath plank walks where they have burrowed securely ever since “improvements” began.  At some seasons, indeed, there is no mud; because the high winds from the lake or the prairies turn the mud into dust, which blinds our eyes, fills our mouths, and makes us Quakers in appearance and anything but saints in heart.  Chicago-walking resembles none but such as Christian encountered as he fled from the City of Destruction; yet in this case the ills are those of a City of Construction.—­sure to disappear as soon as the builders find time to care for such trifles.  Chicago people, it is well known, walk with their heads in the clouds, and, naturally, do not mind what happens to their feet.  It is only strangers who exclaim, and sometimes more than exclaim, at the dangers of the way.  Cast-away carriages lie along the road-side, like ships on Fire Island beach.  Nobody minds them.  If you see a gentleman at a distance, progressing slowly with a gliding or floundering pace, you conclude he has a horse under him, and, perhaps, on nearer approach, you see bridle and headstall.  This is in early spring, while the frost is coming out of the ground.  As the season advances, the horse emerges, and you are just getting a fair sight of him when the dust begins and he disappears again.  So say the scoffers, and those who would, but do not, own any city-lots in that favored vicinity; and to the somewhat heated mind of the traveller who encounters such things for the first time, the story does not seem so very much exaggerated.  Simple wayfarers like myself, however, tell no such wicked tales of the Garden City; but remember only her youth, her grandeur, her spirit, her hospitality, her weight of cares, her immense achievements, and her sure promise of future metropolitan splendors.

The vicinity of Chicago is all dotted with beautiful villa-residences.  To drive among them is like turning over a book of architectural drawings,—­so great is their variety, and so marked the taste which prevails.  Many of them are of the fine light-colored stone found in the neighborhood, and their substantial excellence inspires a feeling that all this prosperity is of no ephemeral character.  People do not build such country-houses until they feel settled and secure.  The lake-shore is of course the line of attraction,