According to the Chinese legend, the bodies of cats and dogs and even children that are engulfed by this ooze are never recovered. They cannot float on the surface and they cannot sink to the bottom; neither do they disappear by the ordinary processes of decay. In a bloated, water-logged condition they are destined to remain a part of the ooze forever, or until the waters of Lake Michigan, coursing through the new drainage canal toward the Gulf of Mexico, shall deliver them to the natural elements of pure water and pure air, in which to dissolve back to original particles and gases. There are stagnant pools in the centers of Chinese cities that have attained sufficiently fetid conditions to warrant legends such as the foregoing. These abominations of far-off Cathay are noisome indeed, but we, who have seen and otherwise sensed both the Chinese putrid pools and the Chicago River, assert that the latter is the worst of all. * * * * * During the World's Columbian Exposition there convened in Chicago a congress of humanitarians under the name of The World's Parliament of Religions. By its membership and its accomplishments it earned the unqualified respect of the civilized world, and the eminent teacher and scholar, Professor, Doctor Max Müller, proclaimed it the most important event in civilization of the Nineteenth Century. Suppose, for illustration, that the members of this humanitarian congress were to be gathered upon one of the bridges that span the Chicago River and were to witness, standing upon the deck of an excursion steamer, a group of well dressed women and well fed men engaged in watching the frantic efforts of a multitude of children of all ages who had been cast into the ooze of the river, and were either settling deeper and deeper into the slime, or vainly trying to climb up the slippery piles to the wharves. Suppose that also there should be seen along the banks of the river a number of policemen whose only duty seemed to be not to allow the innocents to escape, or, if escaping, to prevent their rubbing against people in the streets for fear of soiling immaculate toilets with the filth in which they had been wallowing. Suppose that no one hastened to the assistance of the little ones or offered them ropes or ladders of escape, but, on the contrary, some should occasionally push one who had almost reached the brink back into the stench as children sometimes thoughtlessly torment rats that are trying to escape drowning.