1851-1951
By DEREK HUDSON " For the great world's Exhibition, Let's shout with loud hum, All nations never can forget The glorious First of May?: Seldom, therefore, can the actual centenary of a memorable historical event have arrived with a greater sense of anti-climax. We are almost sated with the Great Exhibition. We have pored over those quaint engravings and daguerreotypes and calotypes for so long, laughedat the preposterous statues, respectfully studied Paxton's blotting-paper sketch, marvelled at the fierce controversies and the elaborate statistics which the Exhibition provoked. And now we are confronted by a whole new series of centenary publications—by an admirable general account from Yvonne ffrench, an economic survey by Professor C. R. Fay, a well-illustrated booklet compiled by Mr. C. H. Gibbs-Smith, and by two long and valuable chapters in Mr. K. W. Luckhurst's The Story of Exhibitions.
These books should make quite clear what Christopher Hob- house took pains to denythat the Great Exhibition was a highly important achievement. It was important, first of all, because It was a great success. Being not ()ill) the first international exhibition •but. as Mr. Luckhurst , says, "the first international gathering of any kind to be held for pur4y peaceful purposes." it directly encouraged and inspired all the many international gatherings that have since taken place. Presumably it has also had a greater influence on international trade and travel than any other historical event. And although the idealism of 1851 suffered an early blow from the Crimean War, the principles set forth by Prince Albert in his mdmorable speech at the Mansion House are still the principles that guide to..in all our attempts to work internationally for the " unity of mankind." The trcmcndous educational stimulus imparted in the course of a century by the institutions founded at South Kensington is, again, beyond computation. Nor should we forget the enter- tainment and pleasure provided by the Crystal Palace at Syden- ham for eighty years, although this did involve the rejection of the plea, made in a pamphlet of 1852 by " A Medical Man." fora Hyde Park Kurhaus which should combine " all that is desirable in the Spas of Germany with all that is decent in the Roman Thermae." ..
The new books are also useful because they remind us (though sometimes we must read this between the lines) that the Great Exhibition has not only been great fun for the contemporaries of Christopher Hobhouse and Osbert Lancaster but was even greater fun for people living a hundred years ago. Victorian earnestness is something that we think we know about, though we have usually taken a superficial view of it ; but the revers of the medal. Victorian gusto, the spirit of a time which bred character and variety and eager enjoyment of life, is something not so often understood. Compare the engravings in Mr. Gibbs.: Smith's booklet showing the Exhibition on a five-shilling day , and on a shilling day. The former strikes the solemn, earnest note that most of us, would expect ; but the mass of clattering horse-drawn traffic and the dense crowds representing the " industrial classes " on the shilling day are just as revealing.
One of the best places in which to investigate Victorian gusto , is Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor, first, published in 1851. But I cane discuss Mayhew here ; I should , like instead to take down from the shelf three small, relatively trivial, yet significant books, all published in the same year and all inspired by the Great Exhibition. As escapist literature X„ have found nothing more satisfying to carry in the overcoat pocket than The Stradametrical Survey of London by Captain N. Scrope Shrapnel, late 3rd Dragoon Guards. It has the supreme advantage that you cannot possibly read it, for it con+ sists entirely of " the mean distances, with their relative cab fares, from all the principal streets, squares, or places in London, to the Great Exhibition, and the several railway termini in the Metropolis." Twenty years ago I put Shrapnel to the test by driving in a cab from the British Museum to Hyde Park, and I then found that, allowing for the fall in the value of money, the taxi was only a slightly more expensive luxury than the hansom. In recent years the balance of comparison has, of ' course, shifted greatly in favour of Shrapnel.
I take Shrapnel's compilation as a characteristic example or the scientific gusto of 1851. For the serious treatment of the Exhibition as an instrument of education, and for a rather devastating revelation of the gusto (or earnestness ?) of paternal benevolence in 1851, I reammend Little Henry's Holiday at the Great Exhibition, by " the editor of Pleasant Pages." This book opens with a scene between Papa, Henry and his sister Rose; who are travelling to Hyde Park in a hansom. After Papa has given them a very full statistical account of the erection of the Crystal Palace, Henry enquires: "Have you finished youestory, Papa ? " " Not quite," replies his father, plunging into a detailed.. survey of the attendance and receipts. Henry expresses a dutiful wish to add them up. " You may do so tomorrow," says Papas " and the exercise shall form your arithmetic lesson." Soon • they are proceeding up thet Nave of the Palace. When they. , reach the Zinc Statue of the Queen, Papa rather weakly admits,. that he does not think it " a very pleasing statue." Rose readily, agrees, but Papa soon pulls himself together: " The figure may not be pleasing, Rose, but the statue is a very important work. It is cast in zinc, a metal which, as you will have learned, is well suited for statues." " Yes, I remember its qualities. Papa," adds little Henry, revealing for the first time that remarkable grasp, of technicalities which is to stand him in good stead throughout the day. " Zinc is light and hard, and less fusible than lead. It, is also more brittle, and brea. ks with a sort of grain."
Tempting though it is to linger at the side of this prodigy, . I turn to an example of religious gusto: Martin Tupper's Hymn, for all Nations." translated into twenty-five languages, including. that of the Ojibway Indians, and exhibited in Class XVII of the Exhibition. Even Little Henry's Papa was driven to exclaim,,, as he settled into the cab for the homeward journey: " All men 7 can see that Truth and Juftice are more beautiful than anything, in-the Exhibition " ; and Tupper's Hymn shows the same pre-. occupation, common to many serious-minded Victorians, lest the Exhibition should prove to be nothing more (as " A Spiritual Watchman " contended in an angry pamphlet) than " a splendid piece of human art dedicated to Mammon." Even Tupper mately came out with a sonnet that began: " Yet was it an unsatisfying meal, A poor dry pittance to the Souls Of men...."
' We see, therefore, that the earnestness and the gusto of 1851 were really one and indivisible ; that the Exhibition was not Merely successful and smug but at the same time conscientious rind bumble ; that, while in retrospect the detail is often comic, the idealism of the conception stands out as something both noble and pathetic. We shall do best, however, to think of it 'finally in less abstract terms, and to take leave of it where it began, among a circle of honest and patriotic philanthropists, in 'the charming Adam building in the Adelphi which has been ince 1774 the headquarters of " The Society for the Encourage- ment of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce," now known as the Royal Society of Arts. When Princesi Elizabeth, the great- great-grand-daughter of the Society's most famous President. Prince Albert, opens an " Exhibition of Exhibitions " in the ''Society's house on May 1st, 1951, the wheel will have gone full circle. And when, two days later, the King opens the Festival of Britain, it will be seen how far we are worthy heirs of what remains, after all, the outstanding single achievement of Victorian England.
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