THE word “Chicago” used to be spelled “Chicagoux.” Some people think it was named for the “Cheagomeinan River,” which is the Indian name for the Chicago River. The Indians called the Mississippi River “Chacaqua,” which means “divine river,” and I think they worked the name Chicago out of all these notions. My uncle says the name of the French fort in 1688 was Fort Checagou. I like to study about names, and find what they mean, and how many changes they have had before we got hold of them. I have never been to Chicago, but I expect to attend the Columbian Exposition. If you will wait until after that I will tell you something about the city. It is larger than it used to be. THOMAS L. WOOD, JR. * * * * * MY father knows about a man who bought a lot in Chicago in the year 1832 for one hundred dollars, and sold it again about three years afterwards for fifteen thousand dollars! I think that tells a boy better than anything else could, how fast the town grew for a while. Of course it was a nice choice lot, in what suddenly became the business part of the town. I know I should like to have been its first owner. ROBERT TOWNSEND. * * * * * I READ about how Chicago came to be called the “Garden City.” It grew out of hard times. They had what is called a business panic, when everybody owed everybody else, and could not pay them, and business was awfully dull, and people thought the town was going to ruin. The most people had to do was to take care of their grounds. They whitewashed the fences, cleaned up the yards, planted fruits and vines, and did everything they could think of to make their places look pretty. I suppose they hoped somebody would come along and buy them. And that is the way they got the name of “Garden City.” ALICE PETERSON. * * * * * THE people who lived in Chicago about the year 1843 certainly could not have had so high an opinion of the city as people do who live there now. A Mr. Miltimore built a schoolhouse on Madison Street which was called “Miltimore’s Folly,” because people did not believe that there would ever be children enough in the town to fill so large a building. The mayor of the city urged the Council to have it turned into an insane asylum, or sold, and the money from it used to build and care for a smaller building, suited to the present and future needs of the city! I don’t think he could have been a very bright man, because in less than four years from that time the building was not only crowded with scholars, but three others had to be opened in different parts of the city. ROGER SHERMANN. * * * * *