On they go as joy inspires

Daughters, mothers, sons and sires;
On they press in lengthy lines

Where the Crystal Palace shines.

FAIR as the Crystal Palace is, outside and inside; goodly as the curiosities it contains are, and imposing as the throng of visitors may be;

No. 79. JULY, 1851.

H

still one of the most amusing parts of the display is the wonder manifested by strangers on viewing the place. Our readers can fancy a country family, who have never seen London before, entering such a building as the Glass Palace. The surprise, the lifted eyebrows, the shy looks, the questions put to one another, and the odd remarks made, amuse and interest the spectator.

The plan adopted to enable visitors to find any particular article in the Exhibition is very simple. The names of the countries from whence the specimens came are placed over the "bays," ," "corridors," and "avenues ;" and each article has on it a number agreeing with the catalogue.

While looking at the vast collection, it ought not to be forgotten that a milliner was the first contributor to the Great Exhibition. A neat little box, with a key fastened to the handle, containing two very pretty caps of a new and taking pattern, arrived at the Crystal Palace before any of the wonders which have since succeeded it found their way to the glassy pile. The fact of having been the first contributor to the fair of the wide world will no doubt be regarded as an era in her life. The making of those pretty caps must have been light labour, relieved by the hope of being the first in the field of industry.

Many who are fond of fruit-gardens examine with attention the tree-frames, grapetiles, strawberry-tiles, melon-tiles, and celerysockets in the Exhibition. Country people find implements of husbandry in abundance to occupy their attention. Musicians regard with

much curiosity the new patent brass musical instruments spread around, and the collection of piano-fortes, flutes, and violins; and scientific people see enough in the machines, engines, and other curious inventions of all kinds, to set them thinking for some months to come. What with the various productions of nature and art,

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So well and amply is each part supplied—
The eye, the head, and heart are gratified.

The Tempest Prognosticator, or storm foreteller, is a very curious machine. It is formed on the acknowledged principle that leeches, by their positions and motions, foretell changes in the weather. The poet Cowper wrote thus: Yesterday it thundered, last night it lightened, and at three this morning I saw the sky red as a city in flames could have made it. I have a leech in a bottle that foretells all these prodigies and convulsions of nature. In point of the earliest and most accurate intelligence, he is worth all the barometers in the world." Doctor Merryweather has turned the sensitiveness of leeches to account. He has in his apparatus twelve bottles with a leech in each of them, and these leeches by their movements ring a bell, and set forth also in other ways the coming storm. You will hardly suppose that such a creature as a leech could be a bellringer; but the doctor has so contrived his bell-hammers, gilt chains, whalebone, and wire, that the feat is easily performed. When we consider the number of our ships and seamen, and the great loss that is occasioned every year by shipwreck, we cannot but see that any suc

cessful contrivance to give notice of a coming storm must be an invention of great value. The leech will not fail to rise in our estimation, when we consider that

Our little friend can soothe the bed of pain,
And serve us when we cross the mighty main.

The Spitalfields Trophy shows us what English weavers can do. Large and beautiful pieces of silk, plain and figured, are arranged in a most rich and pleasing manner. Blue, crimson, purple, orange, violet, green, and all the colours of the rainbow, mingle their hues; and, as the light from the glassy roof falls softly on them, a large crowd of visitors is sure to be drawn around. We are sure these silks would be too gay and fine to be made into frocks for our young readers.

Among the productions of the "Emerald Isle," (Ireland,) we cannot but point out the Devotional Chair, a beautiful specimen of art. The wood used in the fancy parts of this elegant piece of furniture was dug out of a bog: it is as dark as African ebony, and capable of receiving a high polish. The back of the chair is four feet six inches high, and the raised carvings of scrolls, festoons, shamrocks and oak-leaves, the figures of Hope and Plenty, the Irish harp, and the Irish crown of gold studded with Irish diamonds and emeralds, together with the high-wrought needlework of the panel and cushion-cover in Berlin wool, are, in regard to workmanship, deserving of the highest praise. As a devotional chair, however, we should ourselves greatly prefer a more plain and simple article of furniture. This is one of Ireland's offerings.

O Ireland! dear Ireland! when clouds are above thee,
Though hasty and factions thy temper may be,-
As a warm-hearted sister we look on and love thee,-
Shake hands with old England, and let us agree.

In looking to the thousands of beautiful pieces of work, we cannot but be amazed at the skill and invention of man. Here are ornaments to adorn our houses, and articles for use. They are of ivory, gold, silver, zinc, brass, copper, wood, silk, cotton, wool, and a multitude of other things. Some are the produce of the needle; others of the chisel, the hammer, the loom, or the furnace. Some are from the quarry, and others from the river, the sea, the forest, the plain; from tops of mountains; from the recesses of the valley; from the east, the west, the north, and the south. Oh, there is a wonderful collection of wonders, such as has never been seen before, nor perhaps will ever be seen again!

There are two objects we must not forget: -A case of Bibles, in two hundred languages; and, by its side, a case of tracts and books, in foreign tongues, printed at the expense of the Religious Tract Society, and copies of which have been scattered around the world. If you should go to the Crystal Palace, do not forget to look for this case of tracts you will find it under Class 17, PAPER, No. 154. It was a good thought to place the open Bible in the midst of the Exhibition, and by its side a case of gospel tracts. It is the Bible that has made England a great and free country; and, had it not been for that holy book, there would have been no Crystal Palace.