The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1886-05-01 00:00:00

THE INDIAN AND COLONIAL
EXHIBITION.

GREATER BRITAIN is exemplified as it never
has been in the old country in the Exhibition
to be opened on Tuesday with high and fit-
ting State ceremonial by her Majesty.
Visits to its numerous courts, crowded with
the products of the widely-sundered portions
of the vast Empire on which the sun never
80tS, will be a liberal education. Sir Philip
Cunliffe Owen; the active acting manager of
the last and greatest of the South Kensing-
ton shows, said the other day, in his enthu-
siasm, that the Indian and Colonial Exhibi-
tion was "a thing to see an then die."
The rather, we would say, it is a thing to see
and live—live on in the pleasurable posses-
sion of a larger knowledge of our magnificent
Empire than we had ever hoped to have,
It is a gigantic Kindergarten school, in
which to teach the people of the land all
about the beauty, the vastness, and the re-
sources of India and the Colonies. The
Fieheries Exhibition had its uses, and its
attractions; the Health Exhibition followed
and left us more careful concerning things
sanitary; then came the Inventions, which
amazed us with samples of every conceivable
sort of man's skill. But what was the field
open to any of those as compared with the
limitless scope of :that which the Queen
declares open on Tuesday. The fisherman
might cast his nets in many waters, the
means and appliances for promoting health
vary instructively in different parts of the
world. Invention is cosmopolitan indeed ;
but India and the Colonies suggest them-
.
selv6 to the British mind as themes for
illustration by exhibition of the products of
a character far more interesting than all.
One might read with attention a work on an
important national industry, or seriously and
soberly study a treatise on health.; one might,.
again, endeavour to solve some of the puzzles
which a writer on the multitudinous marvels
of invention would place before us; but an
incomparably more attractive task would be
to turn through the pictured pages of some
comprehensive book of travel in far-away
and wonderful lands, inhabited on the m tin
by people speaking our own tongue, and al-
together by fellow-subjects of Queen Victoria.
At South Kensington we have now that
pictured work. It is in many volumes.
India has several all to itself. Every colons-,
from the Antipodes to Cyprus, has its ample
representation. The work has been got up
regardless of expense, and is indeed luxe. i
one in its presentation. The author is the
Prince of Wales. He has been assisted ably
by Sir Philip Owen and a host of other
Royal Commissioners, who all seem to have
done their best to make the Exhibition re-
presentative and worthy of the Empire. The
Indian Government has co-operated hand-
somely, and the various Colonial Govern-
ments vie with each other in friendly rivalry
in placing whit they have to show before the
visitor in the most costly and finished
manner. Not only does each Colony delegate
its ablest naturalists and men of science to
direct and dispose the exhibits so that they
may bring home to us with truth the die-
tinguishing traits of the country; but such
is the enthusiasm displayedthat the Premier
of one Colony actually left the chief chaege
of affairs of state that he might interpret in
London the reconrces of his distant home.
Canada alone at first seemed backward in
responding to the invitations of the Prince of
Wales to take her part in the Exhibition,
but Sir Charles Tupper, the indefatigable
Canadian High Commissioner, took up the
cause with characteristic vigour, and stumped
the Colony with such success that, though a
little late, the Exhibition Executive were
inundated with applications for space. So
it is that the Exhibition is, what it professes
to be, India and the Colonies in miniature.
There one may see an Indian Palace, with
all its costly carving, faithfully represented
in the magnificent Durbar Hall, the palace
yard, and the massive gateway. There one
may gaze upon trophies representing all the
gold yielded by the Australian fields, and
tremendous erections of bamboo from the
east. Diamond digging at the Cape is ex-
emplified 'picturesquely, and stretches of
Antipodean bush and Indian jungle are
transported and transplanted to Kensington,
flora and fauna and all. These features alone
are sufficient to make the fortune of the Ex-
hibition. A living interest is thrown into
every court by the appearance of native at-
tendants; supplemented by a liberal addition
of models in wax and. in plaster of aboriginal
inhabitants. There is a waxen lady, for
instance, in Sir Victor Houlston's chastely-
arranged Maltese Court, who comes as near
possessing the human face divine as any
counterfeit can. Space would not permit
us now to allude to even the chief points of
interest in the vast Exhibition, but this we
may say, that the world has not witnessed
such a show as her Majesty will, passing
through marshalled masses of her Celonial
and Indian subjects, ivaugurate on Tu .s lay.
The evening lighting will be more elaborate
than heretofore, and the musical arrange-
ments liberal and extensive. . The Prince's
personal share in the work of preparation
and arrangement as Executive Chairman of
the Commission has been unremitting. He
conceived the idea of a Colonial Exhibition
in Britain on a large sc de when acting its
President of the English Commission in
connection with the Paris Exhibition, and
more than a year ago had. elaborated all his
plans, and made many arrangements for
carrying them into effect. How grand the
result has been the public can now see. The
Exhibition should, with the greater know-
ledge of the Colonies which it disseminates,
being about a tightening of the bonds be-
tween the motherland and her stalwart off-
shoots, and prove an immense incentive to
the amplifications .of their commercial. trans-
actions also. A very useful thought of tho
Commissioners was the establishment of an
Ernigration.Office.• in connection . with the
....:xhibition, where disinterested au.l wholly
information may be obtained Now
or a suggestion to our Colonial Office. This
Zxhibition is the last of the series. Why
eot amine to make it pcirratuteit uational
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