THE GREAT EXHIBITION OF 1851.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 594, 12 April 1851, Page 4

THE GREAT EXHIBITION OF 1851.

[From the Weekly Dispatch, Nov. 10.] The following circular has been extensively distributed among the inhabitants of Kensington by the Local Committee of that district: “Exhibition of 1851. —Kensington Local Committee.—Her Majesty’s Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851 have already declared their willingness to give publicity and sanction to parties who are ready to come forward and organize lodging-houses for visitors to the Exhibition ; and in proportion as localities perfect their own arrangements, so will they have the preference in the Commissioners’ recommendations. It is very desirable that, as Kensington and its neighbourhood are so immediately in the vicinity of the Great Exhibition, every possible facility and accommodation should be offered to the anticipated visitors. The Executive Committee of the Kensington Local Committee, therefore, suggest that it is desirable for the inhabitants of the neighbourhood mutually to agree to engage existing lodging-houses, and even to build and fit up proper temporary structures to receive visitors ; and thus, while securing to themselves reasonable advantages, they would have the satisfaction of promoting the comfort and enjoyment of those who will visit the metropolis during the ensuing year. Persons desirous of assisting in this arrangement are requested to communicate with the Hon. E. Curzon, Scarsdale House, on or before Saturday, the 17th of November. (Signed) J. Morris, Secre?ary.” Working Men’s Association. — Accounts from various parts of the country show that considerable exertions are still being made by the working classes to provide themselves with the means of visiting the Exhibition. In various local towns Associations have been formed, the members paying from 3d, to Is. a week, according to their circumstances, A Plan for the Comfort of Visitors to the Exhibition.—Whoever went to the

Exhibition of Cartoons at Westminster Hall must have felt the misery of endeavouring to get a good view in a crowd. The arrangement as to visitors was as good as could be—they came in at one door, streamed round in one direction, and went out at the other door ; the passages were wide, and there was no obstruction, and still everybody was crowded, pushed, squeezed, wearied, and so far suffocated that, at last, in the open air they drew a long breath, like a diver who has just popped his head above water. The crush and delay in such cases comes of people from the middle of the stream elbowing their way to the front, and so crossing and stopping those who are pushing direct on. But to the front everybody must get, or else be content to go away without seeing. Everybody knows that the Exhibition will, from morning till night, be the most incessantly crowded place that ever all the world was bent upon seeing. Now, a very simple contrivance to obviate all these inconveniences would be to raise a double tier, say of three or four steps, in the centre of every passage ; the whole matter would be exactly like a double flower stand, could be made of cast-iron, and need not in any case be more than about three feet high. By this arrangement, four or five streams of spectators could without in the slightest degree crowding upon each other, and with perfect view of every one, pass through the Exhibition at the same time. Of course, these flights of iron paths would cost a goodly sum, and take some time to make ; but as for the cost, they would pay for themselves over and over again in the increased speed with which they would enable the spectators to be passed through ; for one of the greatest difficulties of the Exhibition, indeed one that will at certain holiday times amount to an impossibility, will be to admit all who come, and yet, if there be delay, numbers will altogether miss their chance of seeing. As to the time the work would take, we have real faith in Fox and Henderson. If they can raise, and there is no doubt they will, this building roofing in 18 acres, so that the sun of next New-Year’s Day shall rise upon the finished Palace of Industry, it is quite certain that by March they could place these miles of iron paths.—Expositor, The Queen, it is said, has designed a carpet ; and Prince Albert has executed some pieces of sculpture for the Exhibition. The Koh-i-noor diamond will figure in the gem department. At Yarmouth an ingenious mechanic is at work upon a model of a condensing beam engine, upon a scale of half an inch to a foot. Gholab Singh has ordered specimens of every kind of Cashmerian product to be got ready for the Exhibition. The City of London Committee have received an application for space to exhibit a remarkable model of a new system of propulsion. The variety of articles in process of manufacture or construction is wonderful. William Clifford, of Exeter, is making an architectural model with the pith of the common rush ; while in Jersey an ingenious individual is constructing a weapon which is to combine fowling-piece, rifle, and pistol. Hopeful exhibitors are active every where —from the in= genious mechanic whose bellows are to revive fires to the tune of “ God Save the Queen,” to the lady who is weaving from the produce of her own silk-worms, and the ingenious Yankee of Alabama, who has a new nautical instrument for measuring the altitude of the sun. The model of the dock and town of Liverpool is progressing rapidly ; and a sturdy Welshman is on his way to town with a glass tube full of earwigs, spiders, &c., to place it in the glass-house in the park as the insect “ Happy Family.”

Plan and Elevation of the Building. —A ground plan and elevation has been published by Mr. Wyld, M.P., which shows at a glance the arrangement of the columns, the exhibiting surface, the various entrances, staircases, galleries, refreshment-rooms, offices, &c. The various leading thoroughfares in inmediate proximity to the building are also shown. The ground plan is drawn to the scale of 100 feet to the inch. A description of the building is given in English, German and French, and the plan itself is published at the exceedingly low charge of Id.