A NIGHT-SCENE IN TLIE CRYSTAL PALACE.
AN individual desirous of forming some notion of the immense labour which it costs to amuse the public on a large scale, could hardly find a scene more suitable for his purpose than was the Crystal Palace on last Saturday night, and to an advanced hour on Sunday morning. As early as six o'clock, an air of subdued excitement pervaded the officials, and certain rumbling sounds became audible in remote quarters of the vast building, which looked very weird and sombre in the gaslight. The initiated exchanged glances, whispered, "The trucks !" and observed that the public were being ushered out with unusual celerity, to the parting strains of the great organ. The effect of the empty orchestra by the gaslight is ghostly, and the organ with its clustering pipes looks like a painted build- ing in the air. The nave and transept are lined with double ranges of tables (in green-baize petticoats), which support endless rows of wire pens,—they would draw out to three miles if they were ranged in a single line ; and they weigh ten tons ;—each pen
has a sanded floor, a small provision of barley, and a little tin tank full of water. These preparations for expected guests are preliminary to the great show of Pigeons, Poultry, and Rabbits which is to be opened to the public on Monday morning.
At length the building is " cleared ; " favourable announce- ments are received from the two railway-stations, where pro- cessions of vans are in waiting ; the business of the hour is about to commence, with a general muster of forces, in the centre transept, where a palm-crowned pyramid of chrysanthe- mums furnishes a picturesque rendezvous for the workmen. This is a favourable opportunity for making a tour of the Palace, strangely beautiful in the partial light, for lingering beside the marble tank where the water-lilies are all asleep under the palm- shadows, where the crystal fountain sends flushes of the imprisoned colours in it down among the gold-fish, and the gold-fish come to the surface with an audible smacking of their flaccid lips. In the hanging garden overhead, in the dim forest-like effect of the feathery plants which line the galleries and mingle in the un- certain light with the streamers from the baskets, in the occasional gleams from the glass roof, in the faint rustle and twitter of a casual bird sheltered among the branches, in the silence hardly disturbed by the proceedings at the other end, there is a peculiar charm. This is the time for a look at the Pompeian Court ; the illusion tells at night, when Diomed might be sleeping yonder, and the evergreen wreaths might be withering garlands, the decora- tions of his sumptuous feast. This is the time to see the pillars of the Egyptian temple—pork-pies and American drinks inter- fere with the effect in the day-time—for its clustering pillars grow in height and bulk amid the shadows, and the everlast- ing vigilance of its dusky guardians shows more forcibly under their white head -tire, in their red-brown eye-balls, and in their folded arms. The Sphinx, seen at an angle, with one side of its face in deep shadow and the other touched with a brightness like life, seems really to crouch in real sand, a sen- tinel in advance of the citadel of the dead. It is eerie to pass through the avenues of Greek and Roman statuary ; one feels impelled to cough for reassurance, and glad to catch the faint sounds outside, for the shadows play strange tricks here; the famous groups are full of movement ; the still statues watch them from the sides. The disc speeds from the hold of the player under the gaze of the mutilated Venus of Milo, and the dancing faun performs his inimitable antics in mad mockery of heavy-robed Pallas. The faces of the Grecian philosophers and the Roman Emperors peer through the plants which hide their pedestals, and the White Wolf of the_Forum snarls defiance at a modern world which disputes his authenticity. They are all dead plaster forms in the sunlight, but the life comes into them with the night ; witness the alertness of the great stag who looks out from under a gallery, the bound of the shepherd's dog, and the odd, lurking smile on the faces of many of the statues, totally blank in the day-time. Here is Admiral Duquesne, for instance, positively on the broad grin (does he know that he figures in Fraser's Magazine ?); and Sir Peter Paul all illumined with smiles, as if he had just caught sight of both his wives and innumerable flasks of golden Rhenish. Chaucer has evidently hit upon a droll conceit,—he is grim enough "i' the noontide,"—and the Three Printers have, doubt- less, just returned to their platform-pedestal after an inspection of the very latest improvements in type and machinery.
There is some bustle, and a growing sound beyond the great canvas screen, and the cockatoos—as if with a prevision of strange bright birds coming presently in the character of interlopers, to divert the public from their own familiar bites—are restless on their perches, lifting their clumsy claws in cumbrous disapproval, and scratching their own polls in fractious remonstrance. "Look here ! What does this mean ?" that scaly-clawed old bird in the middle is dis- tinctly asking of the bronze figure in the fountain behind his perch ; "it's not night, you know ; there's light about, and our servants are up and doing,—and yet there's nobody here to scratch our heads, to call us pretty Cocky,' and to get bitten to the bone, or violently startled by a hoarse screech right into her ear, for her pains. What does it mean ; do you hear?" Africa, turning up her bulbous eyeballs and pouting her thick lips, actually grins responsive to the chatter, under the gleam of a passing lantern, and the great water-flags rustle stealthily. The Alhambra looms dim and indistinct, but glimpses of the marble basin, and of the lions which are like nothing on the earth that has life, and therefore strictly orthodox, may be had to great advantage, while the little orange and cypress grove lies still and dark as that over which was actually breathed the last sigh of the Moor. Through the arches opposite, the figures of the kings and the knights stretched ilpon their tombs show out solemnly, and the tramp of the gasman and the watchman, each going his rounds, undisturbed by the preparations for the poultry, adds to the effect.
But now the muster is over, the ninety men have been detailed to their various duties, additional light is turned on, alacrity prevails everywhere, and the trucks begin to rumble from end to end of the building. Fires are burning brightly at the entrances, and the birds are coming. The trucks are remarkable in them- selves, for they present a combination of rough deal planks with the gilded wheels of triumphal chariots. They are actually " accommodations" of the properties appertaining to the last Crystal Palace pantomime, and they will again serve in their former capacity this season. The Committee are in readiness to receive, verify, and " pen " the distinguished visitors, the reports from the stations are so cheering that one platform is said to be " choke- ful," and the other "a perfect sight "; we rush from one to the other to verify the facts, and peer over railway-stairs at vast mountains of dim luggage, but get back in time to witness the occupation of the centre transept by the invading army of trucks, laden from the vans. The first impression produced by this astonishing sight is that all the milliners hi the world have despatched all the new gowns and bonnets in existence to the Crystal Palace ; for the luggage con- sists of the neatest possible baskets, of innumerable sizes, mostly lined with shiny black or white stuff, tied and ticketed exactly like the blissful baskets familiar to all the ladies and ladies'-maids in Christendom. On they come, by dozens, by scores, by hundreds, varied by small, tidy, oblong boxes, suggestive of musical in- struments, or the scientifically-amusing paraphernalia of a "rational evening entertainment," but which are really travel- ling-cages of ingenious construction for pigeons, and aesthetic rabbit-pens on the newest principles. They have been checked off on the catalogue at the entrance, and now they are lifted from the vans, carried off by an active army of men, and ranged along the lengthy aisles of tables and pens with extraordinary celerity. On each basket there is a ticket with a number on it, on every pen there is a ticket with a number on it, and when the first basket is matched with its corresponding pen, and the strings are cut, the first characteristic sound breaks the silence. A splendid cock is unpacked, and popped dexterously into his pen, whence he instantly utters a shrill and piercing crow. "First bird !" From that -moment the activity seems redoubled, and the din increases with every second. The orderliness of the scene is as astonishing as its in- cessant movement, the unpacked baskets, rolled away on their sides, 'are promptly hidden beneath the green-baize petticoats of the 'tables, and pen after pen receives its bright-plumaged occupant. The cocks crow, the hens cluck and scratch, the superb turkey- cocks (their baskets suggest Court-trains) gobble indignantly and -wag their wattles in a fury of mutual detestation ; the pigeons preen their feathers and dance ; the whole assemblage, rapidly displaying its vastness, is full of life, colour, and motion,—a world of beautiful feathered creatures assiduously tended by a small .army of busy men. An individual whom we set dawn as the "head ieeder " is a sight to behold, as he inspects every bird and every .cage, detecting an overturned drinking-tank here, and a deficiency of gravel there ; and the pleading of an anxious exhibitor for the speedy unpacking of "a mother with her five little ones "—this deserving object is a very fine rabbit—awakens all our sympathies. Anecdotes of former Shows are told among the lookers-on, and we deeply regret the absence of a previous exhibitor who brought a magnificent Cochin-Chinese cock, and when his basket was opened addressed him thus :—" Come along, Tommy, you get up !" whereupon Tommy stepped out and shook himself. 4‘ Here's your place, old fellow I" continued the exhibitor, "you come along after me ;" which Tommy did, in his wad- dling, Cochin-Chinese way. Arrived at the pen, his master merely gave him a "leg up," remarked cheerfully, "Good night, Tommy, see you again in the mornin'," and went away. It is to be hoped that Tommy "kept his pecker up" until their meeting. The pigeon pens fill rapidly with beautiful white birds, whose tails expand into fans, lace-trimmed ; with pouters, portentous of breast ; and with the lovely " Homing " birds, who are to fly back
to Antwerp on Tuesday, with their prize numbers stamped upon their wings, and to return on Thursday. The night wears apace,
and still the work goes on. Mountains of baskets are emptied,
rolled away, and reared into other mountains in a corridor, where the immense provision of food for the feathered guests is stored.
"No casualties" is the cheering report. Two game-cocks have, however, had a fragmentary set-to between the bars of their pens and round the corner, and have " tapped " each other pretty freely. The first-comers gradually settle down to sleep, but the defiant crowing and clucking, scratching and gabbling among the late-enfranchised tenants of the late-opened baskets goes on far into the small hours, for the number of entries is quite unprece- dented, and the variety and value of the birds are exceptional. It is three o'clock on Sunday morning before the last entry is verified, the last bird is at liberty to "tuck its head under its wing, poor thing ! " before the workmen are dismissed, and the Palace is left to the occupation of its distinguished guests.
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