And if, after such payment and expenditure, features were of a striking character, and likely to form there shall remain a surplus, it is to be applied submitted the design to the competition of ten eminent an attractive part of the Exhibition. The Commissioners for such purposes connected with the encourage-contractors, four of whom took out the quantities. Three ment of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce as tenders (one a joint one from two of the contractors inshall be determined by the Guarantors, or the vited) were sent in on the day named in the invitation, major part in value of those present at a meeting but all were greatly in excess of the amount which the of their body, to be held for the purpose of direct Commissioners could prudently spend, with a due regard to the interests of the guarantors. ing the disposition of such surplus.

The plans of the Society having thus received the gracious approval of her Majesty, the Council transmitted the Charter to the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1862, and received the following letter from their secretary :--

Council Office, Feb. 20, 1861.

SIR,-I am directed to acknowledge the receipt of Mr. Foster's letter of the 16th of February, enclosing the Charter which has been granted to Earl Granville, K.G., the Marquis of Chandos, Mr. Thomas Baring, M.P., Mr. C. Wentworth Dilke, and Mr. Thomas Fairbairn, incorporating them as The Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1862.

The Commissioners, on the 22nd of November last, agreed to act, after a guarantee had been promised to such an extent as to show a strong opinion in the public mind that the time for holding a second International Exhibition had arrived; after the guarantors had expressed an opinion that the absolute control of the undertaking ought to be entrusted to five gentlemen, named by them; and after the Commissioners of the Exhibition of 1851 had intimated their approval of the project, and their confidence in the proposed mode of management, and had promised their support and assistance. The Commissioners, therefore, gladly accept a Charter which conveys to them her Majesty's gracious assurance that she is earnestly desirous to promote the holding of an International Exhibition of Industry and Art in the year 1862, and that she is pleased to sanction the proposed arrange

ments.

The powers conveyed by the Charter will, however, be practically inoperative until the Deed of Guarantee has been executed. When this has been done, the Bank of England has agreed to advance the necessary loan of money on liberal terms. The Commissioners therefore desire me to request that you will represent to the Council the necessity of having the deed signed as soon as possible. The Commissioners, unwilling to lose valuable time, have, during the interval required for the preparation of the requisite legal powers, taken such provisional steps as their position permitted.

The Commissioners have, therefore, had under their consideration modifications of the plan, which, without destroying its merits, would materially reduce its cost. Government had applied, on the 3rd of November last, The Commissioners having learnt that the French to the Foreign Office, to know whether it was intended to hold an International Exhibition in England in 1862, entered into private communication with that Government, from whom they have received satisfactory assurances of support, accompanied by a statement that it had been the intention of the Emperor to hold an International Exhibition in Paris in 1862, had the project not been entertained in England.

The Commissioners also requested the Duke of Newcastle, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, to announce the design entertained of holding an Exhibition, and the intention of the promoters to apply to the Crown for a Charter; and the Commissioners have been informed that his Grace has addressed a communication to that effect to all the Governors of her Majesty's Colonies.

The Commissioners have had under their consideration

the revision of the rules laid down in 1851, respecting the award of Prizes, the Constitution of Juries, the affixing of Prices, the Distribution of Space, the mode of Classification, and also the Organization of the additional Department of the Fine Arts.

When, therefore, the Guarantee Deed has been executed, the Commissioners hope to be able to proceed at once with the construction of the buildings, and to announce the rules and regulations for the arrangement of the Exhibition. I have the honour to be, Sir, Your obedient servant, F. R. SANDFORD.

To obtain signatures to the Guarantee Deed from persons residing in almost every portion of the kingdom was no light labour, but the work was undertaken by the officers of the Society with an alacrity and zeal which ensured the early completion of the task, and the Commissioners were enabled, on the 15th day of The most pressing point was the building requited for March, to publish, in the London Gazette, a the Exhibition. In 1850, notwithstanding the possession of considerable funds, and the assistance of the most emi-notice that the Guarantee Deed had been signed nent architects and engineers, seven months elapsed before for an aggregate amount of £250,000, which sum a design was adopted. The Commissioners therefore felt it had been arranged should be subscribed before that if they postponed the consideration of this subject the instrument would become binding on the until they were a legally constituted body, the cost of the Guarantors. building would be greatly increased, and a serious risk inThe sums subscribed by 1,092 curred of its non-completion by the appointed time. Guarantors now amount to £438,800, and additional subscriptions are announced each week in the Journal.

The arrangements made by the Society of Arts, when negociating for a site on the estate of the Commissioners of 1851, and their arrangement that the Exhibition was to include pictures, a branch of art not exhibited on the former occasion, rendered it necessary to contemplate the erection of a building in some parts of a more substantial

The intimate connection of the Society with the Exhibition of 1862 has led me to describe, with a minuteness otherwise undesirable, the moting the undertaking, in order that the memproceedings of the Council in originating and probers of the Society and the Guarantors, whether members or not, may be accurately informed of the relations of the Society to the Exhibition. The progress of the undertaking will be watched with a very deep interest by the Council, and

they regard its prospects in a very hopeful spirit. to advise and assist the Commissioners, are of The great interest manifested in the Exhibition great importance and much delicacy; and the by foreign countries, as well as by our colonies success of our manufacturers will be influ-the wondrous growth of our manufactures-enced by the discretion and firmness manithe extension of our trade-the prodigious in-fested by those Committees. Foreign Governcrease in our exports and imports, the growth ments have appointed Commissioners supplied of our population-the increased intelligence of with public funds to direct and superintend the our artisans-the general spread of education- exhibition of the products of their respective the extended influence of science as applied to countries, and by them the products of those the industrial arts-the numberless inventions countries will be severely scrutinized, so as to and improvements by which human labour is ensure a selection which shall represent their diminished, and the powers of production multi-prime productions, or the best specimens of plied-the increase in, and rapidity of, our com- their best workshops and factories. munications with other and distant countries, and Let it, therefore, be our aim to exhibit the best the encouragement afforded to international in-selected specimens of our industry and art, recoltercourse-the facilities of locomotion in our own lecting that superiority in kind, and not excess land, and the habits of travel thus formed or in quantity, is the test by which the challenge encouraged the removal from commerce of inju- we have given to the world's industry is to be rious restraints which limited the free interchange determined. Opportunities neglected do not recur, of commodities-these, and other agencies which and the industrial rivalry we have evoked must be might be suggested, will multiply to an enor- pregnant with results of great moment to a mous extent the present attractions and the fu- country which is regarded as the workshop ture influence of the Exhibition of 1862. of the world-of good, if our opportunity is wisely used; of evil, should it be unhappily neglected.

The subject was so ably treated at the close of our last Session by Mr. Hawes, a Vice-President of the Society (who read a paper at an evening meeting, when his Royal Highness the President occupied the chair), that I cannot do better than recommend those who wish to know the grounds on which we regard the Exhibition in a hopeful spirit, to study the facts and reasoning of that interesting paper.

The Council will consider in what manner the Society can assist in rendering the sojourn of our foreign friends, who may visit the Exhibition, most agreeable to them, and most conducive to the promotion of international interests. By a genial and hospitable reception, and by considerate attentions, on the part of the English people, those who come amongst us as strangers will part from us as friends, and we shall employ an occasion of generous rivalry in exhibiting the products of the world's industry to strengthen the bonds of amity between kindred nations.

Of the activity with which the labours of the Commissioners have been conducted we have satisfactory evidence in the progress of the buildings which are to form the temporary dwelling of the productions of Industry and Art to be there exhibited-in the numerous Committees of The preliminary measures for holding the Exadvice they have called into existence-in.the hibition of 1851 were organised by the Society, various Foreign and Colonial Commissioners under the direction of their President, and the plan with whom they have entered into relations, and then sanctioned by His Royal Highness included in the decisions they have promulgated for the the establishment of periodical Exhibitions. Neverclassification of articles, and the guidance of ex-theless, but for the active exertions of the Council, hibitors.

and the generous support of the members of the Society, the Exhibition of 1862 would not have been undertaken, and the Exhibition of 1851 might have had no successor.

The paper read by Mr. Hawes indicated with much force the great importance of facilitating the visits to the Exhibition of working ment, with their wives and children, by fixing The Charter incorporating the Commissioners a low charge for their admission on one or more for the Exhibition of 1862 recognises the active days of the week, thus encouraging their attend- part taken by the Society, previously to 1851, in ance in large numbers-not for a single visit only, establishing from time to time Exhibitions of the but as often as they can avail themselves of the products of industry and art, which exhibitions it opportunities there afforded for acquiring valuable is declared resulted in, or conduced to, the Exinformation as well as enjoying agreeable re-hibition of the works of industry of all nations in creation. He truly said that the object of International Exhibitions is not to amuse the idle but to teach the industrious-not to instruct classes, but to educate nations, and to show to all the part taken by each in the labour market of the world. The duties to be performed by the Trade and other Committees appointed in our own country,

1851, and it also recognizes the desire of the Society that facilities should be afforded for holding, from time to time, International Exhibitions.

The recognition by the Crown of the functions which have been discharged by the Society, in relation to International Exhibitions, imposes on the Council the duty of extending

their usefulness, and recording their progress as agencies of much importance for the encouragement of Arts. Manufactures, and Commerce. Advantage should therefore be taken of any suitable opportunity afforded by the approaching Exhibition, so to strengthen the links by which the Society is connected with International Exhibitions as to render the promotion of their periodical recurrence one of the recognised objects of the Society.

was not again revived until 1830, when a patent was obtained for the preparation of encaustic tiles, with which the name of Minton has been generally associated, and which have been extensively made by many manufacturers of pottery. The second stage in the revival of the art of mosaic was the invention of Mr. Singer, who sought to produce a perfect imitation of the ancient tesselated pavement of the Romans, by the employment of a very ingenious machine for producing Should the Exhibition prove a great success, clay properly manipulated in the form of the Charter secures to the Society (as I have tesseræ, or small cubes, uniform in size, colour, already mentioned) the possession of the central surface, and hardness, and which were burnt and portion of the building erected for picture galleries partially vitrified. The third stage in the revival to the extent of an acre, and the Commissioners was the discovery, by Mr. Prosser, of Birmingare required to expend out of the surplus funds so ham, in 1840, of an improvement which carried much money (not exceeding with the original cost one branch of the art to a high point of perfecof the works, £50,000,) as, in the judgment of tion, and which consisted in subjecting china the Commissioners of 1851 and 1862, shall be clay, when reduced to a dry powder, to strong required to render the architectural character of pressure between steel dies, whereby it was conthat portion of the building suitable for the ob-verted into a compact substance of much hardness jects for which it is to be employed by the and density, less porous and much harder than Society. Any further surplus will be at the dis-porcelain uncompressed and baked in the furnace. posal of the guarantors, and those gentlemen will doubtless be prepared to co-operate with the Council in rendering future exhibitions as secure as possible.

This discovery was applied by Mr. Prosser to the production of shirt buttons, and has also been extensively employed for this purpose in France, but was employed by Mr. Blashfield in the formation of tesseræ, made for him by Minton, and used with much success in many large works, one of his earliest specimens being the pavement of the hall of this Society which was jointly presented by Messrs, Blashfield and Minton.

May we not adopt the concluding passages of Mr. Wyatt's paper, and say that the noblest works of antiquity derive much of their beauty from form, much from carving, much from colour, but more from the perfection of the industrial arts employed in their construction, and happy it is for this Society to be regarded as the nursing mother of such arts. The applicability of mosaic, as an essential element of decoration, can scarcely need argument. "Its glowing colours would revive our drooping taste for the rich and ornamental, and its imperishability would serve to perpetuate the fact that England once possessed and cherished a decorative art somewhat more enduring than compo."

As the success of the Exhibition could not depend, to any great degree, on the external decorations of the buildings, no such decorations are included in the contract of the Commissioners with the builders. But as the buildings are susceptible of much decoration, it has been thought desirable to originate a subscription, which was begun by Earl Granville, the Chairman of the Commissioners, for the purpose of making experiments in the employment of mosaics on the external walls of the front in Cromwell-road. If those mosaics are successful they will give to the buildings a character which is new in this country, and especially suitable to the climate, and which is hardly to be found on any building north of the Alps. Those of our members who feel an interest in the employment of mosaics in the decoration of buildings will find the subject lucidly expounded in a paper "On the Art of Mosaic, Ancient and Modern," read by an accomplished member of the Society, Mr. Digby It will be in the recollection of many of our Wyatt, on the 3rd February, 1847, and printed members that the Society obtained a full report in our Transactions for that year. He defines on the Paris Exhibition of 1849, through the mosaic as the art of arranging materials, which, valuable services of Mr. Digby Wyatt, whose individually, are artistically inexpressive, so as to paper proved to be of great use in maturing the produce a whole subservient to architectural de-arrangements for our own Exhibition of 1851. coration, and says, that taking the form of either pavement or mural decoration, the art has been connected with most of the noblest efforts of architectural genius.

The simplest form of mosaic, or what may be regarded as closely allied to that art, is the encaustic tile, which is said to have been in universal use in England from 1300 to 1500, but

The reports ordered by the Board of Trade on the Paris Exhibition of 1855, made it unnecessary that the Society should prepare any similar report on that Exhibition, but it will be remembered that several hundred of our Members visited Paris on that occasion.

With respect to the Florence Exhibition, after making inquiries on the subject, the Council

Certificates awarded, 1859, 540; in 1860, 556; in 1861, 842.

Distributed in money prizes to Candidates, Institutions, and Local Boards, 1859, £179; 1860, £210; 1861, £231.

learnt that neither our own Government, nor the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851, or of 1862, intended to send a deputation to Florence, and they therefore resolved on taking the necessary steps to insure a full investigation into this, the first Exhibition of the industrial and Although the number of papers worked in artistic productions of the Kingdom of Italy. 1861 shows an increase on the whole of 25 per They have been fortunate in again obtaining the cent. over those worked in 1860, yet in Engexperience of Mr. Digby Wyatt, who has engaged lish History and English Literature, the into furnish a report on the objects of fine and crease has only been from 82 papers in the decorative art exhibited at Florence. Mr. Wink- former year to 83 in the latter; and I must worth, a Vice-President, who reported on the again repeat the regret I expressed on two former - silk manufactures exhibited in both the London occasions, that our students do not familiarise and Paris Exhibitions, has kindly undertaken to themselves in greater numbers with the history prepare a report on the silk and other indus- and literature of their own country, furnishing as trial productions in the Florence Exhibition. those would do, a valuable discipline of the He was accompanied by your Secretary, who will intellect, and a source of very pure enjoyment. report on the general statistics of the Exhibi- In the applied sciences there was an increase tion, as well as on subjects which may be left in the number of papers worked, but the number unnoticed by Mr. Wyatt and Mr. Winkworth. of candidates in these departments is far below Those gentlemen have been requested to bring what we might expect when we regard the importunder the notice of the Council whatever is cal-ance of a knowledge of chemistry, mechanics, culated to benefit the forthcoming Exhibition, agriculture, horticulture, mining, and metallurgy or future International Exhibitions, and their applied to the arts of production. reports will form papers, to be submitted to members at our evening meetings during the Session, or published in the Journal.

The reports of the Examiners appear for the most part to recognise an improved acquaintance on the part of the students with the subjects of The results of the Society's examinations for examination, and the Secretary has reported the present year were laid before the Tenth An- that increased attention is given in the vanual Conference of the representatives of the In-rious Institutions to systematic teaching, and stitutions in Union, and of the Local Educational less to desultory lectures; but the examiners Boards with the Council, held at the Society's in chemistry, agriculture, and botany remark, house on the 18th of June last. It thus appears that the students in those subjects have trusted that the previous examination of 839 candidates to books for their knowledge, and have not dewas conducted by 73 local boards at 81 places or voted a sufficient portion of their time to the centres of examination; that 750 candidates un-laboratory, the farm, the field, or the garden. derwent the final examination, of whom 133 were The Council recognise, with much satisfaction, unsuccessful and 617 obtained certificates; that the success which has attended the middle class 1079 papers were worked, and 842 certificates examinations, established by our great Universiawarded, of which 216 were of the first class, ties of Oxford and Cambridge, directed as they 287 of the second class, and 339 of the third are to the same ends as our own examinations, class, and that for 237 papers, or 22 per cent. of althongh appealing to a class of students who the whole number, no certificate was given. have enjoyed greater educational advantages I Twenty-one first-class prizes of £5 each, and six-than the candidates for the certificates and prizes teen second-class prizes of £3 each, were gained by of the Society.

candidates. Ten prizes of £5 each were awarded The Society's programme of Examinations for to Institutions whose students obtained first-class prizes; and four prizes of £10, £8, £6, and £4 respectively, were awarded to Local Boards. In eight subjects of examination no first class certificate was given, and no prize awarded. Of the 839 candidates who underwent the final examination, 597 were examined in England and Wales, 231 in Scotland, and 11 in Ireland.

1862 has been published and widely circulated, and supplies ample details for the guidance of Local Educational Boards, as well as of students who may desire that their efforts for self-culture shall be tested by the Society's Examiners. The Council have been authorised to notify the intention of H.R.H. the Prince Consort to offer annually a prize of twenty-five guineas to the candidate who, obtaining a Certificate of the first class in the current year, shall have obtained in that year, and the three years immediately preceding it, the greatest number of such certificates. This prize cannot be taken more than once by the same candidate. It will be accompanied by a certificate

7. To prevent the possibility of unfair advantages being taken from a premature knowledge of the Examination papers, the Examinations must be simultaneous everywhere.

The designs of the gentlemen by whom the organisation of the Central Committee was promoted, are fully explained in a circular letter, addressed by the Society's Secretary to various Provincial Unions, on the 22nd February last, and printed at pages 210 and 211, Vol. IX. of the Journal.

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from the Society setting forth the special character of the prize, and the various certificates for which it was granted. Several friends of the Society have authorised the Council to offer additional prizes for Practical Mechanics, Animal Physiology in relation to Health, Agriculture, Botany, Mining and Metallurgy, Political, Social, and Domestic Economy, and English History and Literature. The Council gratefully appreciate the thoughtful interest which His Royal Highness our President has always manifested in the labours of the Society, and the liberal encouragement to The importance of evening schools and classes the work of self-instruction which the valuable is now universally recognised, and though the prize now offered will give to the intelligent provision for those objects is, as yet, in no adeand persevering student. To win that prize will quate proportion to the want, it appears from be the highest distinction within the reach of the the report of the Committee appointed to inquire candidates for the Society's rewards. into the state of popular education in England, made in the present year, that there now exist 2,036 evening schools, containing 80,996 scholars, in which the instruction is almost entirely elementary. The school life of those children whose parents are employed in manual labour must ever terminate at a very early age, and the tendency of late years has been rather to acce

work, and to shorten the duration of school life.

In the month of February last a meeting of the representatives of various educational bodies, and of certain members of the Council with the chairman of the Board of Examiners, was held at the Society's house, to consider proposals which were laid before the meeting by the honorary secretaries of the Southern Counties Adult Education Society, with the view of forming a Cen-lerate than retard the removal from school to tral Committee for elementary examinations held by provincial and district Unions of Institutions, Adult Educational Societies, and Local Boards in connection with the Society of Arts, and the subject was further considered, and the constitution of the Central Committee settled at the Tenth Annual Conference held on the 18th of June last. The constitution of the Central Committee, as well as the objects sought by its formation, will be sufficiently explained by the following extracts from the Society's Programme of Examinations for 1862:

1. The Central Committee consists of two representatives of each Provincial and District Union and Adult Education Society, four members of the Council of the Society of Arts, the Chairman of the Society's Central Board of Examiners, and six representatives of Local

Educational Boards.

It appears from the report of the Commissioners that 65 per cent. of the children in elementary public schools are between the ages of 6 and 12, few go before 6, very few before 3; that attendance diminishes rapidly after 11; and ceases almost entirely at 13, only 5 per cent. of the children at our day-schools being over that age.

Very much of the instruction acquired before 13 in the day-school will be lost before 18 in the work-shop if not preserved and extended in the night-school, and in proportion as the day-school is extended, will be the growth of a consciousness on the part of our young people that the night-school should complete what the dayschool has begun. It has been found, as the result of careful inquiry by the Commissioners, that two millions and a half of children are now on the books of week-day schools, and that upwards of two millions of the children of working men are receiving education on weekdays. Year by year, hundreds of thousands of children exchange school for labour, and yet of this vast array our night schools provide for less than a hundred thousand young persons. Can Christian philanthropy present higher aims than the intelligent and religious teaching and training of these adolescents during those years when the passions are strong and the allurements to vicious gratifications well nigh overwhelming. And without neglecting its other objects, the Society has sought to encourage every suitable agency for the systematic instruction of the adult student, rewarding the meritorious by certificates of excellence, distinguishing the most successful by prizes of a substantial character, and affording