s of various manufactures,
tapestry, carpets, porcelain, &c., and held public exhibitions of the
works which were offered in competition; while about the same period,
the Royal Academy, as a private society, patronized by George the Third,
rather in a personal capacity than as the head of the legislature,
organized its exhibitions of painting, sculpture, and engraving; and
during the last thirty years exhibitions of machinery and manufactures,
gotten up entirely through the efforts of private individuals, have
taken place not only in the metropolitan cities, in London, Edinburgh,
and Dublin, but in all the principal towns of the United Kingdom.

The earliest national exhibition of industrial products in France,
occurred in 1798, and was followed by others at irregular intervals
until 1819, since which period they have taken place every five years,
and have exercised a marked effect upon the industrial development of
Europe. The brilliant character of the two last of these exhibitions (in
'44 and '49), led to several ineffectual attempts on the part of the
Society of Arts, and others, to interest the British Government in the
getting up of a similar exhibition of the products of British industry,
to be held in 1851.

At length in 1849, Prince Albert, who, as President of the Society of
Arts, had known and sanctioned all these proceedings, took the project
under his own personal superintendence, enlarged upon the original
design by proposing to invite the co-operation and competition of all
foreign nations, and proceeded to settle the principles upon which the
enterprise, thus modified, should be conducted, and the mode in which
it should be carried out.

The first steps toward the realization of this new plan, were made in
the name, and under the auspices of the Society of Arts; but so
universal was the interest which this noble project called forth
throughout the country, that it was thought advisable to make it a
national concern, by taking it out of the hands of the Society, and
intrusting its execution to a body of royal commissioners, appointed for
that purpose by the Government, with Prince Albert as its President; the
Government, meantime, giving its sanction only to the undertaking, and
merely lending its aid when it was absolutely indispensable, as in
correspondence with foreign countries, providing a site for the
building, organization of police, and the cost of such assistance
whenever it entailed expense,