VI. Ander the Crystal and in the Park. "The life of man is much beholden to the mechanical Arts; there being many things conducing to the ornament of religion, to the grace of civil discipline, and to the beautifying of all human kind, produced out of their treasures. " Bacon. A FTER the rural racing jaunt of yesterday, we are again on our way to the Great Exhibition. We pass the barracks, around which we see red-coats keeping sentinel. On the walls is written, in big letters of chalk, so that the wayfaring man, though a fool, can read; "You bloody Saxons," and directly under it "No bloody popery!" Thus do the chance scribblings of the "vulgar" show the effervescence of the public mind. These two signs upon the house of Force-do they not state the question which was debated the other night by England's best minds? Write that debate out, and boil it down, and it is still "bloody Saxon" and "bloody Popery." We should be, indeed, culpable, if before we reach the palace, we failed to notice the elegant gates and delightful gardens which adorn Hyde Park. This Park is 360 acres, or more, in area. It has many gates. The most costly and beautiful is the principal entrance. It cost over seventy thousand pounds alone. It is of the most exquisite carving, and forms a fitting portal to so spacious and inviting a spot. Nearly all of this part of London has been built within ten years. Lofty mansions, cities of squares, crescents, terraces, noble streets and avenues, fine churches and great gardens, are all about us. Lots of land which, in the early part of the last century, brought $60 rent per year, now bring $60,000. But the Exhibition opens. We enter at the east entrance, finding the United States at work fitting up its department. We trust in the end our Union will make a fit and appropriate show. The Times, in speaking of our meagre collection, makes this remark: "They don't 'whip all nature hollow,' but they have several very interesting machines, and the useful character of their display as a whole, forms a really striking contrast to the showy attributes of the national industries developed around them." It is true. There is not so much to catch the eye by the gairish display of our contribution. While crowds surround the Queen of Spain's crown and bracelets, with their jewelled splendorswhile the Indian elephant-saddles have their hosts about them -while the French silver and porcelain tea-service, wrought into every modification of beauty, catch the sight-while the great English carpet, woven by the fifty loyal ladies of London for the Queen, has its throng of admirers-while the Tunissian pack-saddles and brocade costumes, the Milan sculpture, the Wurtemberg stuffed animals, the French tapestry, (oh! how magnificently regal!) each and all are cynosures for eager gazers, our American collection boasts of the utile, non dulce. I spoke of Hobbs, the lock king, in a former chapter. I met him to-day, and he explained his lock, which is on exhibition. It is a permutating lock. The key makes the lock. The modifications which may be made in it are only 1,307,654,358,000! It would take a person more than a Methuselah's age to use these mutations. He opened the lock and explained its intricate complexity. It is a wonder, and excites attention in the United States department only next to the Greek Slave. Upon this day we began to visit the nations in the east end of the building, skipping Russia, whose articles are detained by Baltic ice, and commencing with the German states under the Zollverein. A fine piece of statuary representing the Bacchantes, attracts our attention, while, as if firing at the tipsy followers of the vine-god, is pointed a splendid gun, glittering like a mirror. Next comes an exact imitation of the towers of Heidelberg, complete to the smallest rock. We have a model of Niagara Falls here, but it is a miserable one, affording no adequate idea of the extent of the fall. It is spread over some miles, consequently the cataract looks puny enough. Prussia has one of the most entrancing rooms in the palace. It is lit with colored glass, all figured richly with recesses around, wherein is arranged statuary, paintings, and porcelain frames. We noticed a chess-board, costing $15,000, carved out of silver, set with jewels, and each knight, king, queen, and bishop, a perfect gem of carving in itself. Prince Albert's birth-place, Rosenau Castle, in Saxe Coburg, had its model—a most bewitching piece. The German lasses were waltzing upon the green sward, while a German holiday had gathered its thousands about the castle. While seeing so many fine representations of scenery, and knowing how munificent nature has spread her beauties in my own American land, could I help wishing for some of Cole's landscapes of Hudson or Susquehanna scenery? Could I help wishing for a faithful portrait of that nature which Bryant, in a sonnet to the painter, reminds him before going to Europe, to bear uppermost in his mind: "Lone lakes, savannas where the bison roves, Rocks rich with summer garlands, solemn streams: Instead of these, the observer meets with model towers and ruins, churches, and opera houses, and even models of Swiss scenery. How we longed to see the lofty originals of the latter. I observed in a large glass case, a magnificent representation of Alpine scenery, wherein at a glance was combined every form of sublimity and terror, of loveliness and beauty. The proximity is singular. Upland valleys of softest verdure repose sweetly at the foot of the eternal glacier. Huge snowy peaks, ready for an avalanche, frown over delicious spots of pastoral quietude, while horrid gorges yawn with silence and desolation, near the flowery marge of meadows. Leipsic, with her books, Saxony, with her wool, and long courts of velvets, cloths, and satins, must lead us out into the nave again. Perhaps in the multiplicity of German infinity, you may notice that button trophy, with 21,300 varieties glistening like a miniature universe under the clear light. We are called to refreshments by the whispers of the tired body. That finished, can you help stopping a moment to look at those Indian ivory chairs, that couch of gold, that Eka, or one-horse chariot? Shall we not wonder at the Sancsrit literature in Persia-venture within that Turkish canopy of blue with another tent within, filled with its long hangings of silver laces ? The Mosaic of Italy, is certainly one of the most wonderful things in the Exhibition. Large centre-tables are thus formed, with landscapes and figures, whose perfection shames the pencil. The Coliseum, Romulus and Remus, the Forum, and other classic memories and scenes, are thus preserved in undying freshness of beauty. I know there is no great utility in these costly Mosaics; but taking this branch of labor, at its lowest value, as a mere source of pleasure from the love of imitation or representation of agreeable objects, it nevertheless becomes the remembrancer of scenes of thrilling interest. It is the elegant accomplishment, by which homes are embellished. It enters into the sisterhood of arts, bound by a common bond-the culture of the human, through the influence of the divine, which ever dwelleth in the pure, the fair, and the beautiful! What object is that upon the point yonder, which requires a glass to perceive it? Ha! ha! Ha ha! Can it be? A cherry-stone with twenty-five portraits on one side, and St. George fighting the dragon, sculptured on the other! "Tis sure as any thing most true." Look for yourself! Look for yourself! Italy has at least the palm in microscopic beauty, although yon Herculean Godfrey, from Brussels, in the nave, bears away the guerdon for muscular might! We might fill pages thus depicting each object-which in itself perhaps was a study of years for the artist-but to which we do not give as many minutes. Passing by the statuary of Hero and Leander, which the mournful music from the gallery seems to render more sad, we enter the French tapestry room. There is the French trophy! That hanging, so dazzling in color, so striking in design, at which the eye blenches-cost twenty-six men eight years' labor. That is an object for an industrious exhibition! It is of course from Gobelins. France is not alone la belle France. The finest collection of philosophical and surgical instruments are hers. False legs and arms, and every aid to injured humanity is hers. Not alone does she excel in Lyons silks and laces, but in kitchen ranges and physical sciences. Like her character is her exhibition of industry. Confectionaries of rarest temptation sweeten near "drums, guns, trumpets, blunderbusses, and thunder." Steam engines revolve in beauty, whose polish almost emulates that of her dazzling mirrors! Wigs, in profusion, are within hearing distance of harps, fiddles, flutes, and pianos. A very medley is France, a serious comedy, a laughing tragedy. We have done for to-day; yet much of the Eastern entrance and galleries are not glanced at. We go away stunned, as before, at the immensity of this exposition of toil. Truly the dwarf man, “behind his engine of steam, can remove mountains.” What a mine of meaning is there in the remarks of Lord Bacon, which we have prefixed to this chapter; yet even his comprehension, which almost became prophecy, could not grasp such a stupendous illustration of their truth as is here enshrined. What an ingathering of the world's daily experience is here! Even so feeble a sketch as this will enable the intelligent reader to form some idea of the wondrous world we live in. Again, we visit the home of industry. It is Saturday, and ingress cannot be had until noon, by which time a great concourse has collected. A rush is made, during which examples of English rudeness, especially toward the gentler sex, is so |