"I understand there has been an annual meeting of this description at Coleshill for a considerable period. If noblemen and large landed proprietors who have the opportunities and enjoy the means of establishing such annual meetings for the like or similar trials of skill, would do that in their respective neighbourhoods, it would lead to material improvement in the performance of the ordinary operations of the farmer, and be amply compensated by the immediate gratitude of those assembled, and still more by the reflection in the widely spread and useful results to those in whose improvement in such labours we are so deeply interested."-Charles Lawrence, Cirencester.

THE EDITOR'S TRIP.-No. III.

THE CRYSTAL PALACE.

MY DEAR FRIEND,-Who among us in happy childhood's days ever thought, as he revelled in the wondrous tales of Eastern grandeur and fairy palaces, that he would live to see a building which should more than realize all the glowing pictures the most vivid imagination had drawn? And yet this is really come to pass, and we have together passed a day in exploring the wonders of a building such as we never dreamt of, and in a situation so passing beautiful as to baffle all attempts at description. The ordinary "prosaic phrases" seem far too common-place, and even the rich language of poesy ́would fail adequately to express the feelings by which we were over-mastered, as we passed on from clime to clime, and land to land, from past to present, and present to past, beneath the crystal covering which permitted ever and anon to glance at the world of beauty beyond as within. As I gazed with rapture on the scene without, comprehending so vast a tract of beautiful country, and then on the skill and ingenuity displayed within, and marked how your face brightened up as we examined each successive object of interest, and your foot assumed the lightness of its boyhood (if I may so speak) I could not but think

Beauty still walketh on the earth and air,
Our present sunsets are as rich in gold

As ere the Iliad's music was out-roll'd:
The roses of the spring are ever fair,

'Mong branches green still ring-doves coo and pair,
And the deep sea still foams its music old:

So, if we are at all divinely soul'd,

This beauty will unloose our bonds of care.

'Tis pleasant when blue skies are o'er us bending
Within old starry-gated poesy

To meet a soul set to no worldly tune

Like thine, dear friend!

But a truce to reveries and memories such as thesewe live in a matter-of-fact age after all, and I am writing on a matter-of-fact subject, however marvellous it be, and so must begin at the beginning, after the fashion of the chroniclers of the day, though the Evenings with the old story-tellers might well furnish a model, to one of ingenuity enough for weaving imaginative tales in connection with the specimens of the several climes and ages here gathered together.

The day was everything one could wish, and this really is a matter of no slight moment. After a view of the scenery around, which no one should miss contemplating, our entrance into the Palace reminded us that we lived in an age, when people required to refresh the inner man, as well as feast the eye with beauty. However, not tempted to join the busy crowd, we were soon lost in contemplation of the manifold treasures that were exposed to view. To give any idea of the tout ensemble, or to attempt to give a detail of all the several courts, were inindeed a task for which few are qualified; it were to measure the "world of fancy" only to discover one's own "infirmity." That first view haunts me still like a pleasant dream, the spell of which one would not have broken; and as on many a quiet evening I break my solitude here by cherishing it, and as all I then saw comes up reflected in " memory's glass," I feel that it is not out of place to apply to this palace Marlowe's words, when he would paint beauty beyond expression :

If all the pens that ever poets held

Had fed the feeling of their master thoughts,
And every sweetness that inspir'd their hearts,
And minds and muses on admired themes;

If all the heavenly quintessence they still
From their immortal flowers of poesy,
Wherein as in a mirror, we perceive
The highest reaches of a human art,
If these had made one poem's period,
And all combin'd in beauty's worthiness,
Yet should there hover in their restless heads
One thought, one grace, one wonder at the best,
Which into words no virtue (power) can digest.

Yet, though this be the case, I may select one or two points which may be supposed to have interest for our readers. An examination into details soon convinced us that in this palace larger and more beautiful than it was in '51, persons of every taste may find enough to occupy their attention. There is food for the painter, sculptor, archæologist, antiquarian, ecclesiologist, mechanist, the ethnologist, the zoologist, the florist, &c. A guide is indeed needed in this vast building, and I was fortunate in having provided myself with that excellent and complete guide, for which the public are indebted to Mr. Phillips, the well-known litterateur, and which is indispensable to those who would examine the several divisions with any degree of care.1 I shall not stop to descant upon the life-like appearance of the several groups of Indians, or animals, so admirably arranged; nor the varied beauties of the Greek and Roman statues; nor the masterpieces of modern artists whether of pencil or chisel; nor the wonderful ingenuity displayed in mechanical inventions, which charmed you so much; nor yet the appliances that have been brought to bear to alleviate the distresses of the invalid, in the shape of luxurious reclining chairs, &c. All these things will strike every one. I will rather bring back to mind some of the main features that struck me as we passed through the several courts; since these are not foreign to the general objects we have in view in the management of our little Magazine. And first of all stay we in the English Mediæval court to admire the magnificent doorway of Rochester cathedral, coloured so as to represent it as first put up, and the beautiful iron-work on the door of Lichfield cathedral. The Rochester doorway demands

1 Crystal Palace Guide. By Samuel Phillips. Bradbury and Evans.

more than a passing view. As descriptions of each several court are published, but as unfortunately I do not possess them, I know not how far I may tread upon the ground they occupy; nevertheless, a brief sketch so as to cause our readers to examine it carefully may not be out of place, and this I cannot give in better words than those of Mr. Poole :

"The doorway of the Normans," says that learned writer, were made to receive the greatest share of enrichment, both, perhaps, on account of that desire so manifest in their arrangements, to which allusion has before been made, to present the richest surface to the approaching worshipper; and also because of the words of our LORD, 'I am the door,' consecrating the door for ever as a symbol of His own person, to which there is plainly an allusion in the figure of our SAVIOUR frequently found in the doorway planes of this style, and in the same relative position in later examples. The west doorway of Rochester cathedral is a splendid instance; it is of five concentric arches or orders, enriched with very elaborate devices and resting on as many banded shafts, with highly-wrought capitals. Two of the shafts, however, have a peculiar importance here, for above the bands they become statues of King Henry the First and Matilda his Queen; the King holding a sceptre in his right hand and a book in his left; the Queen holding the charter of the royal endowments to the abbey ; and these, as is truly observed in Winkles' Cathedrals, where this door is figured, are among the very earliest statues in the kingdom. The doorway plane is occupied with a representation of our SAVIour, in the attitude of blessing, surrounded by worshipping angels, and holding a book, while below are the twelve Apostles."

The chapels of Bishops Alcock and West, in the cathedral church of Ely, are among the most magnificent specimens of the Tudor style, and portions of the chantry of the former, and a door of the latter are represented here. Bishop West's chapel was founded in 1534, and as the clause in his will directing that he should be buried in the cathedral was, as Mr. Poole tells us, almost the last of the kind we shall meet, I quote it as illustrative of the principles of that age:

"To be buried in my cathedral church of Ely, in the middle of a chapel by me newly erected, on the south side of the chapel, and a convenient stone of marble to be laid upon me with this writing only -Of your charitie pray for the soule of Nicholas West, Bishop of this see, and for all Christian soules; for the whiche prayer he hath graunted to every persone so doeing fourty days' pardon for every tyme that they shall so pray."

There are also some exquisite specimens of Gothic in the statues from Armagh Cathedral, whilst the floor is covered with specimens of the monuments of Queen Eleanor, William of Wykeham, &c. Indeed, to use the words of Mr. Phillips,

"All the subjects in this court are full of value and interest, and the numerous examples of Gothic art, here collected, which we have not space to describe in detail, form a museum in which the visitor may obtain no inadequate idea of the rich treasures of our country. Passing beneath the Rochester door-way, we enter a vaulted and groined vestibule, the window of which is a beautiful example of the Decorated style, from Holbeach in Lincolnshire, filled in with rich stained glass. In the centre is the very richly decorated font, from Walsingham in Norfolk, an excellent example of the Perpendicular style. The walls of the galleries are lined with statues and monu. ments; those on the garden side are all English, principally from the façade of Wells Cathedral, those on the side of the courts are chiefly from Germany and France . . . . . Amongst the central monuments should be particularly remarked the Arderne tomb from Elford Church, Staffordshire; the monument of Henry IV. and Joan of Navarre (his queen) from Canterbury Cathedral; the tomb of Sir Giles Daubeny, from Westminster Abbey, of about the year 1507; and the splendid monument of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, from Warwick, one of the finest Gothic sepulchral monuments in England."

The German and French Medieval courts afford much material for study, though they are not, I think, equal to the English. Apropos of the Renaissance style, which is treated of in our present number, is the Renaissance court, the effect of which is really very striking.

The façade, a copy of a portion of the hotel, Bourgtheroulde, at Rouen, cannot be passed unobserved. The bas-relief represents the field of the cloth of gold, and the meeting of Francis I. of France and Henry VIII. There are portraits of some of the most celebrated persons who flourished at the period when this style was cultivated; fine specimens of Cinque cento, and above all a copy of the celebrated gates from the Baptistery at Florence, by Lorenzo Ghiberte, which Michael Angelo called the gates of Paradise.

As I call to mind the points which charmed us most, there rises before me in all the distinctness of its several details, the Pompeian court, which gives us a Pompeian