by giant anacondas, only to climb out again, undigested and apparently with no discomfort to the snake. Indian swamis levitated, Chinese boxers feinted, kicked, and threw one another to and fro. (22) Such exotic items are not welcome in the white, civilized and well-regulated part of the Columbian Exposition, but are banished to the lawless margins, where the network of electricity has not yet taken root. The contrast between the white center and the ethnic periphery recalls Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, where the white necropolis Brussels (which reminds Marlow of a “whited sepulchre”) is placed in opposition to the “wild vitality” of the African continent. Against the Day and Conrad’s novella both take place in the same period of history towards the end of the 19th century,where colonialism was at its peak, and where ideas of exotic foreigners both frightened and titillated the bourgeoisie in European and American cities. The boys from the Chums of Chance do not really know how to relate to the ethnic panorama they have strayed into, and they breathe more easily when they find their way back to the safe geometric framework of the White City. The innocent aeronauts of the Chums of Chance occupy a strange semi-fictional position in the world of the novel. On the one hand they appear as characters of flesh and blood who interact with the other characters, but on the other hand they are the main characters in the popular series of Chums of Chance books eagerly devoured by a number of other