FIRST REPORT OF COMMISSIONERS.

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appears that the total number of exhibitors was 13,937, of whom 7,381 belonged toGreat Britain and her Colonies, and 6,556 to Foreign Countries. *

In order to show the proportion contributed to the Exhibition by different partsof this country a table of Local Committees has been prepared; showing in eachClass the amount contributed in money, the extent of space claimed and allotted,and the number of exhibitors (Appendix No. XL).

The character of the Exhibition itself hardly falls within the scope of this Report.The Catalogues that accompany it contain a complete account of the several articlesexhibited, and the Jury Reports that arc also sent herewith form the best record oftheir quality ami merits.

A classified return of the J ury Awards, showing the Prizes awarded in each of theThirty Classes to the Exhibitors of each country, is given in Appendix No. XLl.

Of the general admiration excited by the display, it would bo superfluous for theCommissioners to give any account. Of the beneficial effects which may be antici-pated from a spectacle so novel and so wonderful, this is not the place to speak. Itwill probably be long ere the impulse it has given to industry and civilization willhave reached its highest point; and it is not too much to hope that it may be agesere that impulse will cease to be felt.

In order to record in a permanent manner the sense they entertained of the valu-able assistance afforded them by Foreign States, the Commissioners caused a com-munication to be addressed to the various Foreign Commissions, stating theirintention of presenting to the Governments of their respective countries, as amemorial of the Exhibition, a complete set of the Medals struck by their order, acopy of the Illustrated Catalogue, and a copy of the Jury Reports, illustrated bya collection of photographs of many of the most important articles exhibited. Theseare now in course of preparation.

On the other hand many letters were addressed to the Commissioners and theExecutive Committee, by the Foreign Acting Commissioners upon the terminationof their labours, and their return to their own countries. Copies of these will befound in Appendix No. XLII.

We have now endeavoured, in pursuance of the terms of our Charter of incor-poration, to render for the information of ller Majesty as full an account as possibleof the manner in which wo have discharged the important duties which She has beengraciously pleased to entrust to us, so far as they arc yet completed. Having beendeeply impressed with a sense of the responsibility attending the execution of t.scheme so entirely unprecedented as that of an Exhibition in which the whole worldwere to be the Exhibitors—in which the productions of every race and every climewere for the first time to be gathered together, and the sons of industry throughout the

* In those numbers the Exhibitors of India, Turkey, Egypt, and Tunis , are not included,as woll as many individuals who joined together to send up valuablo contributions, and whoin the official enumeration form but ono Exhibitor. Including those now alluded to, thenumber of contributors was between 15,000 and 10,000.