LLM11716589
The First of May. On May Day, 1851, the Queen, accompanied by Prince Albert, the Prince of Wales, and the Princess Royal, left Buckingham Palace, and turned up Constitution Hill on their way to Hyde Park to open the Great Exhibition. It was a public holiday, and, according to current estimation, never before had London been so full. At least half a million were congregated within the palings of the Park. In the course of debate on the Address at the opening of the Parliamentary Session, Colonel Sibthorp, who, in connection with the Great Exhibition, suffered an access of chronic insanity, publicly prayed that "either a hailstorm or a visitation of forked lightning", he didn't seem to care which ”might descend and destroy the Crystal Palace." The Colonel's pious aspirations remained unanswered. This particular May Day was flooded with sunlight, save for a passing shower, which, with loyal forethought, cooled the air, and laid the dust just before her Majesty set forth on her drive. Like Colonel Sibthorp, the Queen, in declaring the Exhibition opened, concluded with a prayer. But it was very different from the Colonel's. "I pray," she said, in her clear, musical voice, "that, by God's blessing, this undertaking may conduce to the welfare of my people, and to the common interests of the human race, by encouraging the arts of Peace and Industry, strengthening the bonds of union among the nations of the earth, and promoting a friendly and honourable rivalry in the useful exercise of those faculties conferred by a beneficent Providence for the good and the happiness of mankind.” The reference under the Cartoon to "horrible conspirators and assassins was incited by some comments on the Exhibition appearing in the then rowdy New York Herald. May 1851. Illustration for The Queen and Mr Punch, The Story of a Reign, Told by "Toby, M.P." (Bradbury, Agnew, 1898).By English School (19th Century)
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