The Sun.
London, England, 1864-09-07 00:00:00

THE CRYSTAL PALACE

" One Entire and Perfect Chrysolite."

It was admirably said of a beautiful woman by
one of the great wits—and the words, to our think•
ing, may lay claim to be regarded as perhaps the
very loveliest compliment a beautiful woman ever
received—" To know her, is, of itself, a liberal edu-
cation !"

It is no extravagance whatever to assert that
precisely the same remark may be applied—and
applied here, not as a mere charming compliment,
but quite literally, and as the simplest truth—to
the Crystal Palace at Sydenham. To know it, is, of
itself, a liberal education.
Fully ten years have now elapsed since this
noble enterprise was inaugurated. On the 10th of
June, 1854, the gates of the Gardens and
the doors of the Palace were flung open
for the admission of the general public—for the ad-
mission of the public, even then, to no crude, or in-
complete, or hastily arranged collection of curiosities.
But, on the contrary, even then, to an unprecedented
accumulation of wonders gathered together with
great labour, and at an enormous outlay of capital,
from all parts of the habitable globe. So much, in
truth, had, even then, been accomplished towards
the realisation of the magnificent design sketched
out by the originators of this most novel
undertaking, that, comparatively speaking, but
little was left afterwards to be done to that end
beyond what might be described as a touch here
and a touch there, the filling in of the shading of
the picture, within the delicate tracery of the
outlines, already, on that 10th of June, 1854, clearly
and distinctly defined to every one's apprehension.
Such—for example let us say as the running
up to their complete altitude of those two mar-
vellous Water Towers so grandly designed by the
late Mr. Brunel—that Colossus among Engineers
whose ambition seemed to be, as in this, to do every.
thing upon as gigantic a scale as might be in any
way practicable ! And so, precisely, here, acting
upon his favourite instinct—just as in laying down
his noblest railway, the Great Western, Brunel
must needs construct it upon the broad guage prin-
ciple—just as in building his largest steamship,,
the Great Eastern, he must needs eclipse all previ-
ous achievements in that way, even his own earlier
achievement of the Great Britain, by a structure, far
and away, both in size and in symmetry, beyond all
similar enterprises in naval architecture—so,precisely,
in obedience to his old ineradicable instinct in search
of the Gigantic, Brunel contrived, at the beck of
his wizard hand as an engineer to run up these two
enormous Water Towers—at the north and at the
south of that immense range of buildings which
their lofty and symmetrical shafts may be said at
once, so conspicuously, to overtop and to beautify.
Beyond exceptional additions of that kind, require
ing somewhat more time for their completion, the
structure, as a whole, ten years ago, when it was
first opened, was very much what it is now. Since
then, a few resplendent accessories, such as those
Towers have been constructed. The Artesian Well,
for instance, which was then, in 1854, being suc-
cessfully bored to a depth of 250 feet for the sup-
ply of the reservoirs at the summit of those stupen-
dous to wers—that,all-essential ArtesianWeil again,
for example, has been long since perfected
and in operation. Connected with that Arte-
sian Well, connected with those Water Towers
again—connected with them indeed as directly as
causes with effects—the grand array of fountains
distributed artistically among the blooming par-
terres,among the arabesqued flower-beds and verdant
shrubberies of the Gardens, ranged terrace upon
terrace the wondrous array of those Crystal
Palace Fountains, throwing up water to heights
varying from 70 to 250 feet perpendicular, have,
within this decade just last past, been completed.
The internal decorations of the building have been
simultaneously receiving, moreover, one finishing
touch after another—as by a series of happy after-
thoughts. While—externally—under the supervi-
sion of the Master Gardener of the age, Nature and
art together have been,season after season,enhancing
the horticultural and floricultural beauties la'cished
upon the grounds around the Crystal Palace. Those
grounds that are as an appropriately gorgeous and
elaborate setting round that gem and cynosure of
the whole green country-side, that, as we have
already, in the old Shaksperian words, said of it above
as by a sub-title—that " one entire and perfect chry-
solite !" Otherwise than by these casual finishing
touches imparted to it within the last ten years—
otherwise than as enhanced thus in excellence
by occasional improvements or additions, the Crys-
tal Palace was very much indeed, at the outset,
namely, in Juno, 1854, what it is now in 1864, in
this month of September. During the interval of
which Initial Decade in its history, it has been for
the most part, as one may say, just simply—ripen-
ing and perfecting.

A sufficient interval, in truth, has now elapsed
to enable the public at large to estimate, in some
degree at least, the value of the undertaking with a
certain amount of accuracy. These ten years have en-
abled many millions of visitors to assemble within its
transparent walls, under its transparent roof, among
its treasures of art and nature marvellously blended
together, among its stores of statuary, its wonders
of architecture, its splenderous squandering of
colour, its tropical vegetation within, its indigenous
or naturalised vegetation without,among its countless
attractions, both internal and external, attractions
fraught, according to the visitors' option, with in-
struction or with amusement, attractions, scientific,
and artistic, ranging freely over studies as diversified
as music and botany, as sculpture and painting,
topography, geology, ethnology, in fact all the
ologies, as well as almost every other scientfie ter-
minal that the hungriest searcher after knowledge
could reasonably be in quest of. Knowing the
Crystal Palace, however, though the English
public, but more especially the London public, have
happily been enabled to know it, now, during a
series of years, during one whole decade, and know.
ing it as very many of the population must needs
do by this time, pretty intimately, wo would say
for our own part as habiluc:s of the Gardens and
of the Palace that—so much of a Microcosm is it,
so diversified are its charms, so widely con-
trasting and yet so perfectly harmonious
ara the treasures it contains, that—neither age
nor use, nor familiar acquaintance can " stale
its infinite variety." We say this as confidently
as we say it also.gratefully—and this, simply, speak-
ing for once in our personality as an unit among
three millions of Londoners, as one cut of our vast
industrial population, here in England—we say
this (let us repeat the words) as confidently
as we say it gratefully. And the Crystal Palace
has, among our popular haunts, in addition
to many other characteristics that are peculiar
to it, this very rare and purely exceptional
one, that it is never out of season even in the gar-
dens, certainly never out of seaso❑ in the build-
ing. It is never, or o to say, out of season there—
it is always in season. And it is continually
having added to its own intrinsic and permanent
attractions some other extraneous and temporary
attraction more or less remarkable of its kind. The
day before yesterday there was the attraction—
just as it may be regarded manifestly it was
one, at least for the 770XXOL —of :the Forester's
gathering. To-day and to-morrow, again, there is
a magnificent Fruit and Flower Show—of itself a
double lure of a most enticing kind down to that
Palace of Crystal in the midst of that flowery frog.
rant green pleasaunce.

THE PEDESTRIAN FEATS AT THE ALHAIIBRA,
—Mrs. M. Douglas, who for some weeks past has
been engaged at the Alhambra Palace, Leicester-square. in
walking 1,000 miles in 1,000 hours, applied to Mr.
Tyrwhitt, at the Marlborough-street police-court, for
his advice. Mrs. Douglas said sha was engaged to walk
1,000 miles in 1,000 hours at the Alhambra Palace. She
had been walking night and day, Sundays not excepted, for
the past five weeks, and had accomplished 824 miles; and
about five o'clock yesterday afternoon, when about to com-
mence walking another mile, Mr lityld, jun., nephew of the
proprietor, came up to her and said she was not to walk
any more, and broke down the platform. bhe wished to
know what she was to do under the circumstances, as Mr
Wyld's conduct had been a source of great injury to her ;
since, besides not allowing her to accomplish the match,
it would have an injurious effect upon her in preventing
her undertaking other engagements. Mr Tyrwhitt advised
Mrs Douglas to consult a solicitor, who, if there had been
any breach of agreement, would know what to do, Alro
Douglas thanked the magistrate and retired,