INTRODUCTION.

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The Exhibition is open to tell its own tale, and is now submitted to the judg- Conclusion,ment of the world.

All that has been done has been the work of a short and anxious period ofsixteen months. During that time, Her Majesty’s Commissioners have assembledtogether upwards of forty times, to discuss and determine all principles.

When the Commissioners were not sitting, every important detail of action wasconsidered by His Royal Highness, the President, and by Lord Granville, asChairman of the Finance Committee. From time to time, as their services havebeen required, the most distinguished persons in art and science have met inCommittees, liberally to afford their assistance to the Commissioners. Thesegentlemen, to whom the Exhibition is thus indebted, are named elsewhere; andit may be permitted to append a list of the staff, materially strengthened byofficers of the Royal Engineers, both of Her Majesty’s and the Honourable EastIndia Company ’s service, which has carried the work into execution, and also toacknowledge the effective aid of the Sappers and Miners who have been permittedby the Master General of the Ordnance to bring their military discipline andbusiness knowledge to aid in the arrangements of the Exhibition.

The work is done, and the collection made of the productions of 15,000exhibitors, working with the ability God hath given them. To these tve maysay with St. Paul,—■“ In lowliness of mind let each esteem others better thanthemselves.” And to spectators we may reiterate the hope expressed by thePRINCE, that ‘ ‘ the first impression which the view of this vast collection willproduce will be that of deep thankfulness to the Almighty for the blessings whichhe has bestowed upon us already here below ; and the second, the conviction thatthey can be only realized in proportion to the help which we are prepared torender to each other—therefore, only by peace, love, and ready assistance, notonly between individuals, but between the nations of the earth.”

Henry Cole.

Exhibition, Hyde Park,

30 th April, 1851.

Postscript .—The Exhibition closed to the public on the 11th of October. The exhibitorsand their friends were admitted on the 13th and 14th, and on the 15th, a meeting of theCommissioners, with their Staff, was held in the Building, to which the exhibitors, jurors,foreign and local Commissioners, members of Local Committees, and members of the Societyof Arts were invited. The Exhibition was then officially brought to a close by the pre-sentation of the Reports of the Juries by Lord Canning , who, on behalf of the Council ofChairmen , read an address to Her Majesty’s Commissioners, to which His Royal Highnessthe President replied ; after this the Bishop of London delivered a prayer of thanksgiving :the Hallelujah Chorus was sung—the meeting dispersed, and the removal of the articlesfrom the Building commenced.

D 2

Kith Oct., 1851.

H. C.