one hand, there is largely increased information as to what is doing— and what may be done—in the manufacturing districts, on the other there is an advanced appreciation of excellence and added desire to adopt the safest and surest means of attaining it. We deplore, indeed, that the government of this country disdains, or at least delays, to do that which has been so nobly, so effectually, and so profitably done in France; but we are willing to accept so great a boon from any hand, and are bound to consider that, be the motive what it may, this 'Bazaar' will have given a great impetus to British manufacture as deriving value from British art. It was utterly impossible for any visitor to move about the living mass which thronged the theatre without encountering every now and then some proof that, after all, they do not 'manage matters so much better in France.' France, at its national 'Exposition,' fostered by the king, patronised by the nobility, and aided by the people, 'pour la gloire,' furnished no stalls' so unquestionably excellent as some of those to which we refer."
From Douglas Jerrold's Magazine:—
The scene which, during the last month, Covent Garden Theatre was a great demonstration—a great fact. The sight which it exhibited to the country was one to make it think. Within a spacious area were collected innumerable triumphs of industry and skill—a mute parliament of labour. And these thousand objects imagined by ingenuity—created by toil—pleaded in all the eloquence of silence for the rights of those who fashioned them. The workman was represented by his handicraft; the toiling city was shadowed forth by rich stuffs, or glancing metals; and the fabrics, gorgeous from the loom, or dazzling from the forge, cried aloud, although they spoke not:—'Let us accomplish our mission; let us go forth over the earth, civilising, aiding, comforting man; and bringing, in return, plenty to the board, and peace to the hearth, of the toil-worn men and women who have fashioned us!' A 'Bazaar'—'tis a trite word for a commonplace thing—often an idle mart for children's trumpery—for foolish goods brought forth of laborious idleness. But an idea can ennoble anything. Nobility, in its true sense, is an idea; and how grand is the idea which ennobles our Bazaar —which, even apart from its claims as an industrial exposition, makes it a great and holy thing. 'Free Trade.' These words form a spell by which the world will yet be governed. They are the spirit of a dawning creed—a creed which already has found altars and temples worthy of its truth. The Anti-Corn-Law League Bazaar has raised thoughts in the national mind which will not soon die. As a spectacle, it was magnificent in the extreme; but not more grand materially than it was morally. The crowd who saw it, thought as well as gazed. It was not
