ry kind of
success. It benefited England more than all other nations put together,
because it revealed to her people their inferiority in many branches
both of workmanship and design. We all know how conceited people are apt
to become who have no opportunity to compare themselves with superiors.
John Bull, never over-modest, surveyed the Exhibition of 1851, and
discovered, to his great surprise, that he was not the unapproachable
Bull of the universe which he had fondly supposed. He saw himself beaten
in some things by the French, in some by the Germans, in others by the
Italians, and in a few (O wonder!) by the Yankees.

Happily he had the candor to admit this humiliating fact to himself, and
he put forth earnest and steadfast exertions to bring himself up to the
level of modern times.

Henry Cole was the life and soul of the movement. It was he who called
attention to the obstacles placed in the way of improvement by the
patent laws, and some of those obstacles, through him, were speedily
removed.

During this series of services to his country, he remained in the office
of Public Records. The government now invited him to another sphere of
labor. They asked him to undertake the reconstruction of the schools of
design, and they gave him an office which placed him practically at the
head of the various institutions designed to promote the application of
art to manufacture. The chief of these now is the Museum of South
Kensington, which is to many Americans the most interesting object in
London. The creation of this wonderful museum was due more to him than
to any other individual.

It came to pass in this way: After the close of the Crystal Palace in
1851, Parliament gave five thousand pounds for the purchase of the
objects exhibited which were thought best calculated to raise the
standard of taste in the nation. These objects, chiefly selected by
Cole, were arranged by him for exhibition in temporary buildings of
such extreme and repulsive inconvenience as to bring opprobrium and
ridicule upon the undertaking. It was one of the most difficult things
in the world to excite public interest in the exhibition. But by that
energy which comes of strong conviction and patriotic feeling, and of
the opportunity given him by his public employment, Henry Cole wrung
from a reluctant Parliament the annual grants necessary to make South
Kensington Museum what it now is.

Magnificent buildings, filled with a vast collection of