Glances at Europe. Greeley Horace

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СКАЧАТЬ position and retain so entirely the sincere respect and esteem of the British Nation. His labors in promoting this Exhibition began early and have been arduous, persistent and effective. Any Inauguration of the Fair in which he did not prominently figure would have done him injustice. The Queen appears to be personally popular in a more direct and positive sense. I cannot remember that any one act of her public life has ever been condemned by the public sentiment of the Country. Almost every body here appears to esteem it a condescension for her to open the Exhibition as though it were a Parliament, and with far more of personal exertion and heartiness on her part. And while I must regard her vocation as one rather behind the intelligence of this age and likely to go out of fashion at no distant day, yet I am sure that change will not come through her fault. I was glad to see her in the pageant to-day, and hope she enjoyed it while ministering to the enjoyment of others.

      But let us reverse the glass for a moment. The ludicrous, the dissonant, the incongruous, are not excluded from the Exhibition: they cannot be excluded from any complete picture of its Opening. The Queen, we will say, was here by Right Divine, by right of Womanhood, by Universal Suffrage—any how you please. The ceremonial could not have spared her. But in inaugurating the first grand cosmopolitan Olympiad of Industry, ought not Industry to have had some representation, some vital recognition, in her share of the pageant? If the Queen had come in state to the Horse-Guards to review the élite of her military forces, no one would doubt that "the Duke" should figure in the foreground, with a brilliant staff of Generals and Colonels surrounding him. So, if she were proceeding to open Parliament her fitting attendants would be Ministers and Councillors of State. But what have her "Gentleman Usher of Sword and State," "Lords in Waiting," "Master of the Horse," "Earl Marshal," "Groom of the Stole," "Master of the Buckhounds," and such uncouth fossils, to do with a grand Exhibition of the fruits of Industry? What, in their official capacity, have these and theirs ever had to do with Industry unless to burden it, or with its Products but to consume or destroy them? The "Mistress of the Robes" would be in place if she ever fashioned any robes, even for the Queen; so would the "Ladies of the Bedchamber" if they did anything with beds except to sleep in them. As the fact is, their presence only served to strengthen the presumption that not merely their offices but that of Royalty itself is an anachronism, and all should have deceased with the era to which they properly belonged. It was well indeed that Paxton should have a proud place in the procession; but he held it in no representative capacity; he was there not in behalf of Architecture but of the Crystal Palace. To have rendered the pageant expressive, congruous, and really a tribute to Industry, the posts of honor next the Queen's person should have been confided on this occasion to the children of Watt, of Arkwright and their compeers (Napoleon's real conquerors;) while instead of Grandees and Foreign Embassadors, the heirs of Fitch, of Fulton, of Jacquard, of Whitney, of Daguerre, &c., with the discoverers, inventors, architects and engineers to whom the world is primarily indebted for Canals, Railroads, Steamships, Electric Telegraphs, &c., &c., should have been specially invited to swell the Royal cortege. To pass over all these, and summon instead the descendants of some dozen lucky Norman robbers, none of whom ever contemplated the personal doing of any real work as even a remote possibility, and any of whom would feel insulted by a report that his father or grandfather invented the Steam Engine or Spinning Jenny, is not the fittest way to honor Industry. The Queen's Horticulturists, Gardeners, Carpenters, Upholsterers, Milliners, &c., would have been far more in place in the procession than her "gold stick," "silver stick," and kindred absurdities.

      And yet, empty and blundering as the conception of this pageant may seem and is, there is nevertheless marrow and hope in it. "The world does move," O Galileo! carrying onward even those who forced you to deny the truth you had demonstrated! We may well say that these gentlemen in ribbons and stars cannot truly honor Labor while they would deem its performance by their own sons a degradation; but the grandfathers of these Dukes and Barons would have deemed themselves as much dishonored by uniting in this Royal ovation to gingham weavers and boiler-makers as these men would by being compelled to weave the cloth and forge the iron themselves. Patience, impetuous souls! the better day dawns, though the morning air is chilly. We shall be able to elect something else than Generals to the Presidency before this century is out, and the Right of every man to live by Labor—consequently, to a place where he may live, on the sole condition that he is willing to labor—stands high on the general orders, and must soon be up for National and universal discussion. The Earls and Dukes of a not distant day will train their sons in schools of Agriculture, Architecture, Chemistry, Mineralogy, &c., inspiring each to win fame and rank for himself by signal and brilliant usefulness, instead of resting upon and wearing out the fame won by some ancestor on the battle-field of the old barbarian time. Even To-Day's hollow pageant is an augury of this. It is Browning, I think, who says,

      "All men become good creatures, but so slow."

      Let us, taking heart from the reflection that we live in the age of the Locomotive and the Telegraph, cheerfully press onward!

      We will consider the Fair opened.

      I shall venture no especial criticisms as yet—first because the Exhibition is not ready for it; next because I am in the same predicament. A few general observations must close this letter.

      Immense as the quantity of goods offered for exhibition is, it is not equal to the enormous capacity of the building, to which Castle Garden is but a dog-kennel. [I do hope we may have a Crystal Palace of like proportions in New-York within two years; it would be of inestimable worth as a study to our young architects, builders and artisans. If such an edifice were constructed in some fit locality to be leased out in portions, under proper regulations, for stores, I believe it would pay handsomely. Each store might be separated from those next it by partitions of iron and glass; the fronts might be made of movable plates of glass or left entirely open; the entire building being opened at eight in the morning, closed at eight at night, and carefully watched at all times.] True, many things are yet to be received, and some already in the building remain in the boxes; still, I think there will be some nakedness, even a week hence. The opportunity for seeing every thing, judging every thing, is all the better for this, and indeed is unexampled.

      The display from different countries is very unequal, even in proportion: Old England is of course here in her might; France has a vast collection, especially of articles appealing to taste or fancy; but Germany and the rest of the Continent have less than I expected to see; and the show from the United States disappoints many by its alleged meagerness. I do not view it in the same light, nor regret, with a New-York merchant whom I met in the Fair to-day, that Congress did not appropriate $100,000 to secure a full and commanding exhibition of American products at this Fair. I do not see how any tangible and adequate benefit to the Nation would have resulted from such a dubious disposition of National funds. In the first place, our great Agricultural staples—at least, all such as find markets abroad—are already accessible and well known here. Bales of Cotton, casks of Hams or other Meats, barrels of Flour or Resin, hogsheads of Tobacco, &c., might have been heaped up here as high as St. Paul's steeple—to what end? Europeans already know that we produce these staples in abundance and perfection, and when they want them they buy of us. I doubt whether cumbering the Fair with them would have either promoted the National interest or exalted the National reputation. It would have served rather to deepen the impression, already too general both at home and abroad, that we are a rude, clumsy people, inhabiting a broad, fertile domain, affording great incitements to the most slovenly description of Agriculture, and that it is our policy to stick to that, and let alone the nicer processes of Art, which require dexterity and delicacy of workmanship. We must outgrow this error.

      Our Manufacturers are in many departments grossly deficient, in others inferior to the best rival productions of Europe. In Silks and Linens, we have nothing now to show; I trust the case will be bravely altered within a few years. In broad cloths, we are behind and going behind, but in Satinets, Flannels, (woolen) Shawls, De Laines, Ginghams, Drills and most plain Cottons, we are producing as effectively as our rivals, and in many departments gaining upon them. But few of these are goods which make much show in a Fair; three cases of Parisian gewgaws will outshine СКАЧАТЬ