The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1878-11-16 00:00:00

THE PARIS EXHIBITION.

The Paris Correspondent of The Times, writing on Sunday,
says :

"The Exhibition closed at 5 p.m. to-day. The
wintry weather and the anxiety of the exhibitors to
take their departure had negatived all idea of a second
prolongation; but to-day, despite the keen wind and
sombre sky, there were as many as 130,000 visitors,
half of them, however, being free admissions. The
gross receipts since the Ist of May have been
12,653,746 f., whereas those of 1867 were 9,830,369 f.
Of the latter sum, 140,000 f. was for admissions before
the opening and after the close, and 700,0001. for extra
charges, two branches of revenue lacking this time.
While, moreover, in 1867 there were only 400,000 free
admissions, there were this year 950,000, and the
artisan delegates from the provinces have numbered
22,000 in 1878, as compared with 354 in 1867. The
aggregate number of admissions has been 16,032,725,
an average of about 82,000 per day.

"The Working Men's Exhibition also closed te-day
with a meeting at the Château d'Eati Theatre, when
diplomas were presented to the successful exhibitors.
M. Louis Blanc presided, and delivered a warmly.
applauded speech. Adverting to the Champ de Mars
Exhibition as a surprising p7eof of the pacific power
of France, he remarked that while battles might often
be won by superiority in numbers, arms, or position,
a rare combination of virtues was necessary in order not
to despair under defeat, to recover by industry what
had been lost by war, and to tire out adverse fortune
by endurance and resolution. Misfortune had taught
France to cultivate these virtues. Having in other
days earned all the glory derivable from the em-
ployment of force, it remained for her to earn the
less noisy but more real glory conferred by the practice
of wisdom. Who would have believed at the time of
the military catastrophe of Sedan, of the treason of a
man whom shame prevented his naming, of invaded,
paralyzed, half-conquered France, and of bombarded
'Paris, with its museum windows barred with sacks of
earth, its pictures casemated, its statues mattressed,
that in a few years Paris, again the centre of universal
life, would be thronged by foreigners admiring the
dazzling assemblage of all that attested the greatness
of human genius? M. Louis Blanc then dwelt on the
excellence of the working men's productions, mostly
executed in leisure hours with imperfect tools, and
thanked the Municipalty, General Council, and
Chamber of Deputies for their encouragement. Com-
menting on machinery as a formidable rival to the
artisan, he remarked that were men all united, and
were solidarity of interests realized, machinery would
economize human effort, instead of resembling those
terrible divinities which demanded human sacrifices;
but under the universal antagonism which was the
economic basis of modern societies, it crushed the
weak and diminished employment. As an example
of this, he mentioned that in the House of Commons
in 1835 840,000 persons were shown to have been
doomed to starvation by machinery in weaving. To
curse the steam-engine would be as foolish as to curse
the hammer, photography, or telegraphs, The evil,
as Sismondi said, was the unfair division of the pro-
duct ; and the more machinery was introduced the
shorter should be the hours. Even if, as was asserted,
machinery ultimately increased employment, while
the grass was growing the steed was starving. Com-
pared with the value of things, the value of man had
fallen, and women or children took the place of men.
After strongly condemning child labour as threatening
to reap the harvest while in flower, M. Louis Blanc
concluded by extolling the Workmen's Exhibition as
a vindication of human dignity, and an appeal for the
placing of science at the service of in lieu of supplant.
trig humanity,"

FOR THE NEWLY-MARRIED I—A charming drawing.
room "Sweet."—Your own dear little wife in her
daintiest of toilettes I—Judy.

,

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