Page:Australian views of England.djvu/93

  the genius and skill of mankind have garnered up for everybody at South Kensington, and which will lose none of their lustre by being left till the illustrious have passed on. In the meantime you will be amply supplied with descriptions of the Exhibition. In England we have these descriptions morning after morning till the mind is appalled by the frightful capacity of the writers. Nevertheless, I much fear the Exhibition will prove a signal failure in attracting visitors in numbers corresponding to the magnitude of the preparations of Art and Science. On arriving in London lately, I was surprised to find so little change in the public thoroughfares; a few more Frenchmen was all that was noticeable in the street crowds, and those neat little pasteboard indicators, which in every alternate window invite you to "furnished apartments," were as plentiful as ever.

It was a sorrowful thing to see the Royal widow of him who took such pride in this Exhibition, rushing away in her grief to the farthest spot at her command from its inaugural ceremonies. I was at Stafford on the 30th of April, and had occasion to leave by the night mail. The new