Then, having satisfied their appetites, they spent some time in examining
the relics on exhibit in the building.

One of these was a picture of the Madonna by Raphael. There was also an
exhibition of carvings done by women, which excited both admiration and
surprise, and in one of the rooms was some richly carved furniture from
the State museum at Baton Rouge, which had once belonged to Governor
Galvez.

They went next to the Florida building, which was a reproduction of old
Fort Marion, whose foundations were laid in 1620, the year of the landing
of the Pilgrims in Massachusetts.

The captain mentioned that fact, then asked: "Do you know, Grace, how long
that fort was in building?"

"No, papa," she replied, "can you tell us?"

"It took one hundred and fifty years of toil by exiles, convicts, and
slaves to construct the heavy walls, curtains, bastions, and towers of
defence. Its bloodiest days were more than a century before our Civil War,
in which it did not take a very prominent part."

"Where are the curtains, papa?" asked little Elsie. "I don't see any."

"It is the name given to that part of the rampart which connects the
flanks of two bastions," replied her father.

"And it was here that the Apaches were imprisoned," remarked Walter.