8

INTRODUCTION.

Visits to the

manufacturing

districts.

building upon the scale then thought of, and for preliminary expenses, wasestimated at the least at £70,000.

After much fruitless negotiation with several builders and contractors, an agree-ment was made between the Society of Arts and the Messrs. Munday, by which thelatter undertook to deposit £20,000 as a prize fund, to erect a suitable building,to find offices, to advance the money requisite for all preliminary expenses, and totake the whole risk of loss on certain conditions. It was proposed that the receiptsarising from the Exhibition should be dealt with as follows :—The £20,000 prizefund, the cost of the building, and five per cent, on all advances, were to berepaid in the first instance : the residue was then to be divided into three equalparts ; one part was to be paid at once to the Society of Arts as a fund for futureexhibitions ; out of the other two parts all other incidental costs, such as thoseof general management, preliminary expenses, &c., were to be paid; and theresidue, if any, was to be the remuneration of the contractors, for their outlay,trouble, and risk. Subsequently the contractors agreed that instead of thisdivision they would be content to receive such part of the surplus, if any, asafter payment of all expenses, might be awarded by arbitration. This contractwas made on 23rd August, 1849, but the deeds were not signed until the 7thNovember following.

For the purpose of carrying the contract into execution on behalf of theSociety , the Council nominated an Executive Committee of four members, whowere afterwards appointed the Executive in the Eoyal Commission, and the con-tractors their own nominee. In thus making the contract with private parties forthe execution of what, in fact, would become a national object, if the proposalshould be entertained by the public, every care was taken to anticipate the publicwishes, and to provide for the public interests. It was foreseen that if the publicidentified itself with the Exhibition, they would certainly prefer not to beindebted to private enterprise and capital for carrying it out. A provision wasmade with the contractors to meet this probability, by which it was agreed, thatif the Treasury were willing to take the place of the contractors, and pay theliabilities incurred, the Society of Arts should have the power of determining thecontract before the 1st February 1850. In the event of an exercise of this powerthe compensation to be paid to the Messrs. Munday for their outlay and the riskwas to be settled by arbitration.

The Society of Arts having thus secured the performance of the pecuniarypart of the undertaking, the next step taken was to ascertain the readiness of thepublic to promote the Exhibition. It has been shown that the proof of thisreadiness would materially influence Her Majesty’s Government in consenting tothe proposal to issue a Royal Commission to superintend the Exhibition. ThePrince Albert, as President of the Society of Arts , therefore commissionedseveral members of the Society, in the autumn of 1849, to proceed to the“ manufacturing districts of the country, in order to collect the opinions of theleading manufacturers, and further evidence with reference to a Great Exhibitionof the Industry of all Nations to be held in London in the year 1851, in orderthat His Royal Highness might bring the results before Her Majesty’s Govern-ment.” Commissioners were appointed, visits made, and reports of the resultssubmitted to the I rmce, from which it appeared that 65 places, comprehendingthe most important cities and towns of the United Ivmgdom, had been visited.Public meetings had been held, and local committees of assistance formed in them.