DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1310#0143
: "
114 THE GREAT EXHIBITION
so numerous, so rich, nor so varied as those of French industry, with which, excluding
Austria, they might be most appropriately compared—though the Germans were in the
Exhibition remarkably deficient in machinery—their products were numerous and miscel-
laneous. In general, except as to cast iron, bronzes, chemicals, dyes, and some woollens,
German industry seemed a step below that of either France or England. It is,: however,
plain, that the Germans have a great aptitude for improvement: we regard them as only
recently aroused to a due sense of their relative position in knowledge, skill, politics, and
morals, to the rest of Europe. They occupy a noble country; and as they become sensible
of their wants, they cannot fail to achieve a commanding succcess. In them we have great
reason to be interested, and them we must wish to see strong, prosperous, and united.
They stand between European civilization and Cossack barbarity; and the hope we have
that the latter will not be suffered to advance and prevail westward, rests on the Ger-
mans, and rests on the improving people as contradistinguished from their interfering,
and, we are afraid, sometimes retrograde rulers.
Before we entirely take bur departure from the Zollverein department, we must
not omit to notice one very amusing and interesting feature it possessed; we allude to
the collection of stuffed animals, which were indeed so admirably got up, that they
were worthy of the attention of Waterton himself, the great Nimrod of South America,
of whose prowess in the savage wilderness, among the ferm natures, his own ancestral halls
in the heart of Yorkshire afford ample testimony, and whose redoubtable arm slew, in
single combat, every grim specimen he has therein collected and so skilfully preserved.
Judging from the crowd that was always collected around the stuffed animals in the
Zollverein department, it would seem to have been the most popular group of objects
in the Glass Palace. Doubtless, some part of its attractiveness was due to the pre-
dominance of family parties in the collection. Quite independently of treatment, any
artist who introduces the young of animals and the instincts of maternity in operation,
is sure of attention. Here we had partridges and their young, hawks and their young,
a hooded owl protecting her nestlings from the onslaught of weasels, a female fox and her
cubs awaiting their sagacious sire, who is bringing them a partridge to feast upon. There
were also groups in caricature. Stoats and weasels, in sportsman-wise, pursued their
game of young hares and rabbits. A party of kittens were enjoying the pleasures of the
tea-table, and various other amusing groups were exhibited, in which the artist had
succeeded in throwing a most whimsical air of sentimental gentility. The most attrac-
tive portion, however, of this display, consisted of a series of tableaux from the old poem
of Reynard the Fox, a great favourite with the German children, and which we remember
to have seen powerfully illustrated in the dark mysterious etchings of Roland Roghman.
The incidents that were selected for representation were, the Cock receiving Reynard's
confession of sin—Reynard leading the Hare to Court as a witness—Reynard at Home,
carelessly reposing on a sofa, his tail resting on his left arm, and equipped with sash and
dagger, a la brigand. Our hero was next seen attacking the hare on his way to court,
after which he was represented giving the cat a letter of introduction to court. It was
impossible to conceive anything better than the attitudes of all these animals, and tbey
had just as much clothing put upon them, as was necessary to produce a good effect.
114 THE GREAT EXHIBITION
so numerous, so rich, nor so varied as those of French industry, with which, excluding
Austria, they might be most appropriately compared—though the Germans were in the
Exhibition remarkably deficient in machinery—their products were numerous and miscel-
laneous. In general, except as to cast iron, bronzes, chemicals, dyes, and some woollens,
German industry seemed a step below that of either France or England. It is,: however,
plain, that the Germans have a great aptitude for improvement: we regard them as only
recently aroused to a due sense of their relative position in knowledge, skill, politics, and
morals, to the rest of Europe. They occupy a noble country; and as they become sensible
of their wants, they cannot fail to achieve a commanding succcess. In them we have great
reason to be interested, and them we must wish to see strong, prosperous, and united.
They stand between European civilization and Cossack barbarity; and the hope we have
that the latter will not be suffered to advance and prevail westward, rests on the Ger-
mans, and rests on the improving people as contradistinguished from their interfering,
and, we are afraid, sometimes retrograde rulers.
Before we entirely take bur departure from the Zollverein department, we must
not omit to notice one very amusing and interesting feature it possessed; we allude to
the collection of stuffed animals, which were indeed so admirably got up, that they
were worthy of the attention of Waterton himself, the great Nimrod of South America,
of whose prowess in the savage wilderness, among the ferm natures, his own ancestral halls
in the heart of Yorkshire afford ample testimony, and whose redoubtable arm slew, in
single combat, every grim specimen he has therein collected and so skilfully preserved.
Judging from the crowd that was always collected around the stuffed animals in the
Zollverein department, it would seem to have been the most popular group of objects
in the Glass Palace. Doubtless, some part of its attractiveness was due to the pre-
dominance of family parties in the collection. Quite independently of treatment, any
artist who introduces the young of animals and the instincts of maternity in operation,
is sure of attention. Here we had partridges and their young, hawks and their young,
a hooded owl protecting her nestlings from the onslaught of weasels, a female fox and her
cubs awaiting their sagacious sire, who is bringing them a partridge to feast upon. There
were also groups in caricature. Stoats and weasels, in sportsman-wise, pursued their
game of young hares and rabbits. A party of kittens were enjoying the pleasures of the
tea-table, and various other amusing groups were exhibited, in which the artist had
succeeded in throwing a most whimsical air of sentimental gentility. The most attrac-
tive portion, however, of this display, consisted of a series of tableaux from the old poem
of Reynard the Fox, a great favourite with the German children, and which we remember
to have seen powerfully illustrated in the dark mysterious etchings of Roland Roghman.
The incidents that were selected for representation were, the Cock receiving Reynard's
confession of sin—Reynard leading the Hare to Court as a witness—Reynard at Home,
carelessly reposing on a sofa, his tail resting on his left arm, and equipped with sash and
dagger, a la brigand. Our hero was next seen attacking the hare on his way to court,
after which he was represented giving the cat a letter of introduction to court. It was
impossible to conceive anything better than the attitudes of all these animals, and tbey
had just as much clothing put upon them, as was necessary to produce a good effect.