The Express.
London, England, 1867-10-17 00:00:00

LONDON, THURSDAY EVENING, OCTOBER 17, 1867.

Shipments since the departure of the last mail,
130,121 bags, of which 7,875 were for the Channel,
57,087 for the north of Europe, 10,227 for the
Mediterranean, 4,498 for the Baltic, and 50,434
for the United States. Sales 105,000 bags. Stock
40,000. Freights, 70s.

BAHIA, San. 29.

Exchange on London, 21f to 21k. Sugar:
Whites, 2,800 reis. to 3,500 reia. ; browns, 2,350
reis. to 2,380 reia. Cotton, 10,500 reis.

PERNAMBUCO, Ocr. 1.
Exchange on London, 21 to 21f. Sugar, whites,
4,400 to 4,600 reis. Browns, 2,200 to 2,250 rein.
Cotton, 11,500 to 11,600 rein.

LISBON, Ocr. 15.
The Messageries Imperiales steamer Estramadurs,
with thdeßrazil mails, arrived here to-day. She
brings 1,472,249 franca in specie.
The Navarre arrived at Dakar on the 10th inst. ,
and the Oneida at Bahia on the 28th September.

THE PARIS EXHIBITION.

(PROM OPE SPECIAL 001

Our official reporters continue to point out
departments in which either the entire Exhibition
is a failure, or in which we have failed. Unfor-
tunately those unpleasant statements seldom admit')
of refutation, and most certainly when, after
pointing out the splendid and complete exhibits in,
civil engineering and public works, which the
French have on the Champ de Mars, the reporter
adds that England can hardly be said to be repre-
sented at all—it is impossible to contradict—there
is not even an excuse for qualifying the statement.
We have been engineering all the world over for
many years. We have built thousands of miles of
foreign railways, thrown stately bridges across
broad rivers dug out ports, drained lakes,
driven a steam horse over mountains. The
energy and skill of our engineers, backed
by the capital of our daring—sometimes too
daring—contractors, have appeared wherever there
have been gigantic labours to accomplish. We
could fill a township with plans and models ; and
yet we find the field here left entirely to our neigh-
bours and rivals. Undoubtedly, civil engineering
would have been sensibly advanced had somebody
been at the pains of making a great show of English
civil engineering beside that of France. Surely
our Society of Civil Engineers would have done a
useful work had they made a complete collection
of engineering models for exhibition. Now, when
the gates are on the point of being closed, the offi-
cial reporter tells us that the public works of
London alone might have supplied admirable ex-
amples in the great railway stations and river
bridges recently constructed, as well as the works
connected with the main drainage and the Thames
embankment. Our neighbours, through their
School of Arts and Trades, and their Administra-
tion of Bridges and Roads, had less to do
in order to get a complete civil engi-
neering exhibition together than our Eng-
lish authorities would have had to undertake
in order to produce a like result. But because our
shameful lack of organization made the work
tedious and difficult, was it rightto abandon it, and
to leave British civil engineering unrepresented
before the world ? It is a grave reproach to the
authorities of South Kensington that they have
permitted this gap in our section of the Exhibition
to exist. We are shamed by the unrivalled array
of exquisitely finished models of bridges, docks,
tunnels, viaducts, &c., which the French authori-
ties have marshalled under their flag. The exhi-
bits of lighthouses, lightships, and lanterns, which
our Trinity-house and Commission of Northern
Lights make, and which are excellent in every re-
spect, reflect no credit on that department,
which I maintain was bound to obtain a
complete set of engineering models for the
Exhibition, or to explain how it was impossible
to get them. " Impossible," Lord Brougham
has said " is the mother-tongue of little souls."
It is a language, however, not unfrequently heard'
in public offices. When it is stated that the en- ;
gineering connected with lighthouses is almost the ,
only British work in this section exhibited in Paris,
the reader will perceive how grave the omission is.
The ornamental tiles of Minton and Mawe, the'
brickwork and terra-cotta facade of the South Ken- j
sington Museum, sent by G. Smith and Co., andi
the English terra-cottas, are noticeable works.
The open pavilion in terracotta thrown over the!
English boilers by Messrs. Blanchard, is a work of
great skill, as well as of taste and clever clay-
baking. But where are our engineers ? Belgium
and Germany have some remarkable models and
illustrations of new systems o! tunnelling, of cheap
railway-bridge construction ; and in the Italian I
department are the sections and plans of the Mont ,
Cinis tunnel-boring. Even Spain has a sectional ,
model of the breakwater at Tarragona. But,
France has in the Exhibition no rival, j
as it is vulgarly said, within a hundred
miles of her. Her admirably organized
Department of Public Works have grouped under'
the eyes of all nations all her engineering glories,
of the last dozen years. Our official reporter says
that a careful study of the admirable collection of i
models and plans exhibited by the French Public
Works Department cannot fail to produce the con-
viction that the works they represent have been
most scientifically designed, and executed with '
great care, practical skill, and economy. Anything
like a detailed description of these models would
fill columns. The great swing-bridge of Brest, the
model of M. Vaudray's masonry arch, the full-
sized model in the park for casing large centerings
from arches by restingthe principles of the centering
upon sand, enclosed in perforated cylinders, from
the bottle of which the sand is allowed gradually to '
exude; the splendid models of the iron railway
viaducts of La Cere, Busseau, D'Ahun, and of the
Midi ' • M. Reynaud's iron lighthouse, which has
been the admiration of every exhibition visitor,
and has told Paris the whereabouts of the Exhibi-
tion by night ; the tunnel of Ivry ; and above all, ;
the elaborate and charming exhibition of the Baron I
de Lesseps' Isthmus of Suez works (which i
form an exhibition apart) ; these are among ,
the leading features of the engineering glories
which France has to show in 1867
while we exhibit a terracotta boiler
house, and the facade of the South Kensington
Museum ! America, who is weak in this section,
is stronger than us. She exhibits an interesting
model of a wooden swing-bridge from Ohio. The
only consolation vie are offered for the lathes of our
authorities in Class 65 is that no nation except
France has put forth her whole engineering
strength in this Exhibition. This is paltry mate-
rial enough for consolation. No nation save Eng-
land could venture to compete for prizes in civil
engineering with France. The two " leading
nations" are practically the only rivals in this
class. An exhibition of the industry and skill of
all nations, it is taken for granted by the mass who
visit it, justly represents the relative industrial ex-
cellences of each country in every class. The mass
make no allowances. They are come to learn the
lessons that are set before them. Only the ini-
tiated know that although England is absent from
Class 6.5, her civil engineering is magnificent, and
is spread over the world. This class, as it is spread
upon the Champ de Mars at this moment, is draw- •
ing thousands to a wrong conclusion, since it is
impressing upon them an idea that in civil engi-
neering France has no competitor in the world.
Mr. Cole dwells on the importance of terra-cotta,
and is proud of the open boiler pavilion. The skill
with which the roof was deposited upon the terra- ,
cotta columns was, I remember well, the admira-
tion of the hundreds of French mechanics who wit-
missed it. It showed them the resources of British
skilled workmen ; but it must have made them
wonder the more at the complete neglect of English ,
civil engineering, and the silence with which the

invitation to exhibit trophies of skill has been met
in England. Pray observe the extent of our error.
We enter no evidence of our engineering force, and
at the same time our workmen make no contribu-
tion to the tenth group. The Prussians, Germans,
Danes, Swedes, and Italians of the working claas
who have critically surveyed the Exhibition have,
of ct.urse, sought the exhibits of the tenth group
And what have they seen ? Why only a French
court, admirably arranged, of the trophies of skilled
workmen. There are, in this court, two trophies
of rival corporations of carpenters—the celebrated
—on many bloody occasions too celebrated—Gavots
and Devoirauta. They are extraordinary models
of scaffolding and eharpente. The men who planned
them are learned journeymen, and they have been
borne in the trade processions as glorious monu-
ments of skill and trade knowledge. In this same
court are castings, carvings, engineering models of
many kinds, a complete model dwelling, minutely
finished within and without—some noble examples
of chasing and repouss6 work. These are all work-
men's exhibits.
I paused some time before two most interesting
little works. They told the whole story of French
excellence in art manufactures. They were
plates of repowesi work by two female relatives of
the famous Vechte. The delicacy of the master
was peeping clearly out in these happy issues from
i'prentice hands. The great art-workman in France
spends much of his time teaching the generation
that it may beat beauty out of a &tandem of silver,
when his cunning hands shall be rigid in death.
It is so not only in art industry. The artist is ever
a teacher. The great painters conduct great
academies. Should a Giotto be found under a
hedge, he may be straightway led to the dominant
art authorities of his epoch, and sans bourse defier
get his knowledge at the fountain head. The dif-
r fusiveness of French art is its most hopeful side.
That which a Gerome, a Bonheur, a Meissonnier

knows he freely spread;over the youth of his time.
He is not a surly trader, opening his studio doors
only to let the dealer in. He is of liberal nature, or
the system under which he has grown is liberal
and the rays of art are carried far and wide
among this apt race. When we have sluggishly re-
solved to get art-teaching of a high order—of the
highest we have—within the reach of all posaiblo
,hedgerow genius obscurely straying in our midst,
we proceed clumsily and not liberally. The teachers
should be high priests in art temples ; the neophite
should be drawn to the altars. But how stands the
case 1 Our masters raise no temples, no academies.
I The teaching is relegated to the mediocre—it has
been playfully observed, the worst ochre an artist
can use. The French show unbroken lines of art-
' workmen and art-workwomen : the great in their art
and science are the teachers thereof. Teaching is
not in France, as it most assuredly is not in Eng-
land, the shortest road genius, and wisdom,
which comes of knowledge, can Ake to fortune.
' But it is the most honourable of functions. It is
the sacred duty of him who knows best and deepest
' about science, system, or art-mystery, to impart
his knowledge, that the generation which is to fol-
low him may get all available advanced stand-
points for further pr
Our position in therlaiibition shows how frigidly
and in what niggardliness of spirit we go to work.
The shrug of official shoulders which answered the
generous proposition that in the Exhibition of 1867
there should be a tenth—a supplementary group—
! expresses our whole mi A and spirit in these things.
llf the French system be too severely paternal,
, surely we permit a little too much roughing. I
remember a theoris‘ of repute who reached the
conclusion, in educational matters, that it was best
for the man to make the boy "rough it." Accord-
ingly, having a son, he applied his deeply-cogitated
principle. The boy Rent bare-footed, bare-necked.
He never wore hat or cap. Spartan black-bread
' would have been Lis fare had it been at hand.
Many a time have I seen the brave lad trotting by
the side of the pare t with a theory, while mothers
along the highway paused and cried shame upon
the man. He was ► true man, however. He was
conscientious acco.ding to his light ; but the boy
died under his tiv atment, after a span of life that
must have been, I fancy, an unbroken pang. The
' little heart wa. that of a lion, and the baby
face had Or, sustained gravity of a D.D.
As that theorist treated his child so do we
cultivate industrial art, and, indeed, fine
art. I cannot conceive anything colder and
more repellent than an art school—as we
arrange it ; nor a human creature less likely to
kindle a flame in smouldering genius than the
average British drawing master. The clay rises
and sinks to a beautiful presence under warm
fingers only; and the British official finger of art is
as dry and tough as any in the Egyptian exhibit
of mummies. If it were not so, should we have re-
mained thus cold and scornful while our lively and
sensitive neighbours were dressing this delightful
little court of artistic labour ; and while their
scientific men were spreading their great show of
engineering models 1
Wintry winds are playing round the Exhibition.
Visitors (some 30,000 daily) are in great coats and
muffled to the nose ; and hot drinks have succeeded
the iced drinks of the summer.

THE ADULTERATION OF FOOD AND DRINIE.—At
the Shropshire quarter sessious, held in July last, a com-
mittee of magistrates was specially appointed to inquire
into the subject of the adulteration of articles of food and
drink, and into the system of licensing ale and beerhouses
in country districts. The committee have now concluded
their labour', and have drawn up a very valuable report,
which will shortly be printed and copies forwarded to all
the County Quarter Sessions in the kingdom, with a view
to inducing co-operative action for the repression of the
evil of adulteration.

THE ENGLISH PRIZE WINNERS AT TEL BELGIAN
TIRNATIONAL.—Tbe directors of the Belgian Tir National
have just issued the list of prize winners, by which it is
shown that the English volunteers who visited Brussels
. during the fats were even more successful than it was sup-
they were. In the long-distance shooting the hand-
: sup-
posed
our shooting volunteers who had aminnuition sufli-
cient to continue firing for more than a few hours, were
particularly successful. sa will be seen from the following
enumeration of the •' vainqueurs." In the cable o volonte,
in which the competitors could enter as often as they
pleased, Mr. Russell, of the 24th Kent, won the first prize
—spurge containing 400 f., he having made 22 points in
this five shots. Colour-Sergeant Corti*, of Worthing, won
the second prize—a purse containing :W., he also having
made 22 points. Mr. Wyatt, of the London Rifle Bri-
gade, won the sixth price—a purse containing 1001.—with
29 points. Dr. Ryan, of the South Middlesex. won the
[ 9th prize-7M.—with 19 points ; and Captain Field, of
the Hon. Artillery Company, won the 17th, a purse of
50f. Prizes were also given for the most beaux Manes,
land the second, a handsome medal of honour, was won by
Colour-Sergeant Corti*. In the long range cible fize' in
which each competitor was only allowed two series of five
shots, Mr. Wyatt, with 21 points, won the second prize
given by the government, six " couverts" of silver lot 12
pieces of plate), with 21 point'. The fifth prize of the
same character was won by Lieutenant Paget, of the 87th
Regiment, stationed at -Widmer, with 18 points. The
eighth prize was won by Mr. Corti', and consisted of " four
couverts." The 19th prize, " two converts," was won by
Mr. Rumen • and the 30th, " one convert," was won by
Captain Field, who, it should be remarked. has won
converts here before. At the short range of 25 metres,
about 240 yards, Mr. Russell in the cable i volonte,
won two prizes for " blancs ;" end Mr. Wyatt, at the
short cible hue?
won two more converts for points, he
20, which brought him in the 90th prize. Mr.
rl= in the course of his shooting, made 152 blancs,
and a silver cup was given to him for that achievement.

- -
FRIGHTFUL SCAFFOLD AGUIDKNT. Yesterday
morning an accident happened in the Queen's-road,
Wandsworth, which it is feared will terminate fatally.
The injured persons, all of whom are bricklayers and
labourers, were working on new houses in course of erec-
tion in the Queen's-road. The brickwork had been carried
to • considerable height, and necessitated the use of •
large quantity of scaffolding. Whilst the men were at
work one of the supports gave way. throwing the men to
the ground. They were conveyed to Bt. George's Hos.
pital. Their names are Robert Jones, aged 43, of
Crighton.street, Wandsworth, severe fracture of the skull ;
Benjamin Batty, aged 24, of Thurlowetreet, Wandsworth,
severe in ury to the ribs and spine ' • Thomas White, aged
20, of Alfred-terrace, Colville-road, Battersea-park, severe
contusions ; and a fourth man, whose name was unknown,
received severe internal injuries.