Tallis, John: Tallis's history and description of the Crystal Palace and the exhibition of the world's industry in 1851 (Band 2) (London, 1851)

OF THE "WORLD'S INDUSTRY. 143

For if the ocean be as naught in the hollow of thine hand,

And the stars of the bright firmament, in thy balance grains of sand :

If Niagara's rolling flood seem great to us who lowly bow,

Oh! great Creator of the whole, how passing great art Thou !

But though thy power be greater than the finite mind may scan,
Still greater is thy mercy, shown to weak, dependent man—
For him Thou cloth'st the fertile fields, with herb, and fruit, and seed,
For him, the woods, the lakes, the seas, supply his hourly need.

Around, on high, or far, or near, the universal whole
Proclaims thy glory, as the orbs in their fixed courses roll;
And from Creation's grateful voice the hymn ascends above,
While Heaven re-echoes back to Earth, the chorus,' God is Love-'

CHAPTER XX.
GLEANINGS AND REMINISCENCES—(Continued.)

THE RAILWAY PRINTING TICKET—CTTEIOUS FACTS—THE QUEEN1 S DEAWING-ROOM—WARDIAN CASES
----EOX'S MAONETISED BALANCE—INDIA-RUBRER AIR GUN—SMITH'S COMIC ELECTRIC TELE-
GRAPH----EIRE-EXTINGUISHING CEILING ----SPITALEIELE-s' SILK TROPHY----EUR ABU FEATHER-
TROPHIES----THE LADIES' CARPET—FACET'S OEREBY----SELF-ACTiNG FIRE ALARUM AND BAIL-
TV AT WHISTLE — GRAPHIC DELINEATION—ITOEY CARTINGS—COLOSSAL PORPHYBT TASE—
MOLfLENEOEGH's CANDELABRUM.

The Railway Printing Ticket,—What a simple tiling is a railway ticket! merely a square
inch of cardboard, coloured blue, white, or green, as the case may be, with certain caba-
listic figures across its face, and the names of the towns of departure and arrival printed
thereon ! Passengers by railway—and they are numbered, now-a-days, by tens of thou-
sands—step from their cabs or omnibuses, not always without a dispute with the driver,
pass into the station, walk up to the counter, pay their money, and receive, in return,
the little ticket before mentioned. How few travellers by rail ever bethought themselves
how that ticket was produced. To be sure, they saw the station clerk pass a piece
of pasteboard into a sort of iron cylinder, heard a sharp click, and the next instant saw
the ticket skimming across the counter towards them, by means of an official fillip,
acquired by long practice; but of the ticket itself they knew nothing, and, of course,
cared nothing about it, except as to its actual use. The piece of paper which is to frank
them all the way to Liverpool, Edinburgh, Ireland, or elsewhere, is shown to the guard
in waiting, as soon as the passengers by that train are seated and ready to start; is passed
into a side-pocket, or watch-fob, if the passenger happen to be a gentleman, or carefully
deposited in a purse or a glove, if the aforesaid passenger be a lady ; and is altogether
forgotten by the habitues of railways, or nervously felt for, and looked at every now and
then, by the noviciates in travelling experiences, till it is peremptorily called for at the
end of the journey—"Get your tickets ready!" "Your ticket, ma'am, if you please/5 is the
porter's manner to the first-class passengers; "Ticket, sir," is the style of that official to
travellers by the second-class; and "Now, then, tickets!" the ordinary phrase and
demeanour adopted towards the riders in parliamentary trains, or the open cattle-trucks,
popularly known as the third class. All have their tickets, and all the tickets are
alike in form and substance, differing only in colour and numbering. Let us look to the