Triumphs and Wonders of the 19th Century: The True Mirror of a Phenomenal Era / A volume of original, entertaining and instructive historic and descriptive writings, showing the many and marvellous achievements which distinguish an hundred years of material, intellectual, social and moral progress

by James P. Boyd

II. FOREIGN WARS.

Napoleonic Wars.—The long contest between France and Austria began when the Girondist ministry of France declared war, April 20, 1792. By the execution of Louis XVI., January 21, 1793, the Revolution threw down the gauntlet to all ancient Europe. England, whose sympathies had hitherto been more or less with France, began to take measures to bring about more cordial relations with the other powers of Europe. Spain, Portugal, Austria, Prussia, and Russia, for the time seemed to forget their several grievances as they found themselves confronted with a totally new move on the chessboard of European autonomy. The year 1794 saw the French Revolution progressing triumphantly, and all Europe, except England and Austria, appeared acquiescent in apathetic indifference. In 1795 the royalists made a supreme effort to recover power, but were crushed by the “Man of Destiny,” and the Directory, consisting of five members, of whom Carnot was one, came into power. Dominated by the martial genius of Carnot, “the organizer of victory,” the Directory won the confidence of the army. Scherer, the commander, lacked the qualifications to undertake a successful campaign against Austria, and Bonaparte, succeeding him, soon infused his own spirit into the army and bound it to himself with a devotion that never failed.

Early in the year 1800, Napoleon, having been made first consul, took up his abode in the old palace of the kings of France, the Tuileries. The history of Napoleon for the ensuing fifteen years is the history of Europe. It is, therefore, best to begin with the close of the eighteenth century, in order to appreciate the situation at the dawn of the nineteenth.

Austria and England, with several small German principalities, were still in arms against France. The plans and movements of the armies under Napoleon showed him to be verily a master in military skill. Opening this campaign, he left Massena with about eight thousand soldiers to hold the territory from Nice to Genoa, so as to keep the Austrian army in Italy busy. He sent the Rhine army, under Moreau, to threaten Bavaria and to secure the most important position between the Rhine and the Danube. Moreau drove the Austrians to Ulm, and disposed his left flank to support Napoleon. Meantime, he himself was recruiting another army for operations on the Po. Baron de Melas, commanding the Austrian troops in Northern Italy, besieged Massena in Genoa, which, after severe suffering, surrendered, leaving De Melas free to join the army of the Po. Napoleon was between de Melas and Austria. General Ott, with eighteen thousand men, attempted to reach Placentia, but Lannes, with twelve thousand, defeated him at Montebello, forcing him back to Allesandria. Napoleon hastened across the Po to Stradella to intercept De Melas and prevent his breaking through the French lines to Placentia.

NAPOLEON, 1814. (MEISSONIER.)

The night of June 13, 1800, the French army was scattered, watching along the Po and the Tessino for the Austrians, while their army, forty thousand strong, with ten thousand more not far distant, was ready at daybreak of the 14th to cut its way through the armies of France, and reach Placentia. The French force was but eighteen thousand, but Victor with his division held his position firmly, and the great leader, Kellerman, was in command of the cavalry. Backward and forward surged the battle with varying fortune, and at noon victory seemed perched upon the banners of Austria. De Melas was so certain that the battle was won that he galloped back to Allesandria and sent dispatches to that effect to the governments of Europe. General de Zach was left in command to conduct the pursuit and to drive the French across the Scrivia. Napoleon, dismayed, hoping against hope that Desaix, whom he had sent towards Novi the day before to look out in that quarter for De Melas, might hear the thunders of the battle and return, saw him in the distance, hurrying with his troops, who, though worn and tired, were eager for the fight, and Napoleon saw already the tide of battle turned.

Desaix had found no trace of the Austrians, but he had heard the sound of battle at day dawn, and he knew that De Melas was there, and that there he was needed, and not at Novi. He roused his division, and hastened back to Napoleon. A short conference with his chief, to whose questioning he answered, “The battle is lost, but it is only three o’clock, there is yet time to win another,” and the battle of Marengo, glorious in its consequences to Napoleon, stupendous in its carnage, was won; but Desaix, the brave paladin, lay dead upon the field. De Melas returned from Allesandria to meet the victorious army he had left—flying in disorder—thoroughly routed. On December 2, Moreau and Ney won the field of Hohenlinden, and the “peace of Luneville” was concluded, February 9, 1801.

The result of this campaign was the cession of Austria’s strongholds in the Tyrol and Bavaria to France, as also a number of important holdings in Italy. France secured the left bank of the Rhine, the Belgian provinces and Tuscany, and the king of Naples closed his harbors to England. In March, 1802, by the “treaty of Amiens,” peace was concluded with England.

The coalition of Denmark, Sweden, Russia, and Prussia, with France against England, in 1800, fomented by Napoleon, broke down in 1801, after Nelson’s battle of Copenhagen.

England had secured the supremacy of the sea and dominion over India, rescued Portugal, Naples, and the States of the Church from France, and restored the Sublime Porte to Turkey. Finding Napoleon again militating against her interests, and resenting his encroachments, England declared war against France in the spring of 1803. Russia espoused the cause of England, Prussia held off, and Austria was friendly, though not in fighting trim. The third coalition comprised England, Russia, and Austria.

Powerless to hurt England on the seas, Napoleon, who had the year previous been proclaimed emperor, attacked Austria, invaded her territory, captured her army at Ulm, proceeded to Vienna, and occupied a great part of the valley of the Danube. On December 2, 1805, the “Battle of the Three Emperors” (the battle of Austerlitz) was fought. The “Peace of Pressburg,” concluded December 26, left Austria shorn of her ancient prestige, her title of German Empire, and of a great part of her possessions. The “Sun of Austerlitz” melted the third coalition. In the meantime the battle of Trafalgar, won by the immortal Nelson, crushed the naval power of both France and Spain.

In September, 1806, Prussia declared war against France, and, to the amazement of Europe, alone undertook to engage armies flushed from their recent victories and still in Germany. October 14, Napoleon utterly defeated the Prussians at Jena and Auerstadt, and entered Berlin a conquerer, the king having fled to Königsberg. Russia came to the aid of Prussia, but arrived too late to accomplish anything except to check the advance of the French, whose armies wintered on the Vistula. The next summer, however, the Russians met their final defeat in this campaign at Friedland, and Königsberg was taken. The “Treaty of Tilsit” ended the operations of this fourth coalition July 7, 1807.

The fifth coalition against Napoleon comprised England, Austria, Spain, and Portugal. The decisive battle of this campaign was at Wagram, July 5 and 6, 1809, and terrible as were the consequences of his defeat to Austria, so crippled was Napoleon that he willingly granted the armistice of Znaim and concluded the “Peace of Vienna.” When the fifth coalition ended, Napoleon had acquired the Illyrian provinces and part of the Tyrol for France, and eventually the Emperor’s daughter, Maria Louisa, for his wife.

ADMIRAL HORATIO NELSON.

In 1812 came war with Russia, and that most disastrous campaign which cost France more than three hundred thousand soldiers and Napoleon his empire. Russia, England, Prussia, and Sweden formed the coalition now, and Turkey had made peace with Russia. Napoleon crossed the Niemen in June, halted at Wilna to put his new conscripts in better order, addressed words of sympathy to Poland, and took measures to keep Austria conciliated. The Russians retreated before him. He met and fought and defeated them at Smolensk, August 17; they retreated in good order, burning and destroying all in their reach. The terrible battle of Borodino was fought September 7; the defeated Russians again retreated in good order, pursuing the same tactics. Napoleon reached Moscow September 15, but the heroic measure of Russia in destroying that city was equal in its results to several victories. October 15, the French troops commenced their fearful retreat. The Russian armies grew bold, they harassed the French troops, weak from hunger and cold, and from Moscow to Wilna their progress was one continual guerilla warfare. From Wilna, their flight to France, December 5, was even more disastrous. Of the grand army that set out in the spring not one fourth ever returned.

Affairs in Spain had fared badly for France. Wellington defeated the French army in Spain, and finally expelled it. France, though sometimes shaken in her devotion by the conscription that was draining her children’s blood, still had faith in Napoleon, and in 1813, having raised another grand army, he undertook to subjugate Prussia. His first victory was on the plain of Lutzen. The Prussians and Russians retreated in good order through Dresden. Napoleon pursued and drove them from Bauken, on May 20 and 21, and established his headquarters at Dresden. Austria now joined the allies. In their attack upon Dresden, August 26 and 27, they were defeated, but Russian troops and the King of Bavaria coming up made Napoleon’s position untenable. The allies were awaiting him at Leipsic. The battle raged for three days, and Napoleon withdrew on October 19, utterly defeated.

January 23, 1814, Napoleon, having raised another army, left Paris to assume command. The allies—England, Austria, Prussia, and Russia—were more determined than ever to crush him. Many battles were fought, and the fortunes of war varied. Blucher defeated him at La Pothiers on the 1st of February. Napoleon was the victor at Montenau; unsuccessful at Soissons, March 3; victorious at Cravonne, March 7; and defeated by Blucher at Laon, March 9. With more than half his army lost, Napoleon worried the allies in their rear; but Blucher marched on Paris. The prestige of Napoleon and France in Europe was at an end.

The Empress and the regency retired to Blois. On March 31 Paris surrendered, and the Emperor of Russia and the King of Prussia entered the city. A provisional government, with Talleyrand at its head, deposed Napoleon on April 2, and on April 6 he abdicated. May 30, the First Peace of Paris was concluded between France and the allies. France was to have her boundaries as they were in 1792, and also her foreign possessions, except Tobago, St. Lucia, and Mauritius, which, with Malta, were ceded to England. The Bourbons, in the person of Louis XVIII., were restored; but the French people were not content, so that when Napoleon appeared at Cannes on March 1, 1815, he was greeted with joy, even by the troops sent out to oppose him. This astonishing news was communicated to the Congress of the Allies assembled at Vienna. The allied armies at once gathered on the borders of France, Wellington landed in Flanders, and Blucher’s Prussians joined him. Wellington, finding Napoleon in front of him, fell back to Waterloo, lest the approach of the Prussians should be cut off. Napoleon hurled his force on Blucher at Fluores, and victoriously drove him from the field on the 15th. Ney, who had been sent to confront Wellington, fought at Quatre Bras, and the following day joined Napoleon. On the 18th of June, 1815, Napoleon made his supreme and final effort to recuperate his lost fortunes and to reestablish his empire.

The story of the battle of Waterloo, than which none ever fought was more decisive in its consequences, has been told and retold. The battle was at first undecided, victory seeming to incline to Napoleon, though the English and Germans with unflinching heroism still held the field until the afternoon, when Blucher, with his Prussians, at last arrived. Napoleon perceived that the supreme moment was at hand, and that his only hope was to crush Wellington before Blucher’s advancing columns could be thrown into line of battle. He sent forward his magnificent Imperial Guard. They charged with chivalric splendor, fought with heroic desperation, were repulsed,—and the star of Napoleon set to rise no more.

Finding his cause irretrievably lost, leaving the remnant of his army in command of Marshal Soult, Napoleon fled and, failing to find a passage to America, surrendered. This battle, magnificent in its results, ensured to England a long peace, and raised her to the first rank, for military prowess, among the nations of the world.

Napoleon’s skill at Waterloo was up to the highest standard of his most glorious work; but he was overwhelmed by preponderance in numbers. His entire force with which he conducted this campaign was barely 104,000, while the combined armies of Wellington and Blucher numbered 220,000.

NAPOLEON’S RETREAT FROM WATERLOO.

The Congress of Vienna restored the ancien régime, replacing dethroned monarchs upon their hereditary domains, but the parceling out of the smaller territories showed the Powers to be quite as arbitrary as Napoleon himself. The semi-decade of passive submission to the “policies of princes” was broken in 1820 by general revolts in Europe. Spanish-American colonies, indignant at French interference in Spanish matters, began their struggles for independence.

Greek War for Independence.—Since the capture of Constantinople by the Turks, in 1453, Greece had been subject to Turkey. Out of the defeats of several rebellions against the greed, tyranny, and brutality of the Moslem,—particularly from the revolutions of 1770 and 1790,—grew the secret society of the Hetæria, cementing the union of the Greeks for the struggle beginning in 1821. It is claimed that ten thousand Greeks were slaughtered within a few days, and thirty thousand in less than three months.

Mahmoud, having failed in 1825 to crush the rebellion, called Mehemet Ali, the Pasha of Egypt, to his aid. Mehemet sent Ibrahim, his son, with his army and navy, trained in the tactics of European warfare, into the Peloponnesus. Victory and devastation marked his course. Never was grander courage nor loftier bravery displayed than by the Greeks. The siege of Missolonghi lasted from April 27, 1825, until April 22, 1826. Athens was captured, June 2, 1827. The fleets of England, France, and Russia were cruising on the coasts to prevent attacks by the Turks on the islands. Approaching the bay of Navarino, they were attacked by the Turks and Egyptians, whose combined fleets were thereupon annihilated on October 20, 1827. The Sultan was forced by the powers to consent to the establishment of the kingdom of Greece, and his delay to do so was punished by Czar Nicholas, who declared war, crossed the Balkans, and at Adrianople in 1829 compelled the Sultan to recognize her independence, grant Christian governors to Servia, Moldavia, and Wallachia, and to yield Bessarabia to Russia.

Minor European Wars.—The French Revolution of 1830, placing Louis Philippe on the throne of France, brought about Belgium’s independence.

The Polish insurrection of 1831–32 lost Poland her last vestige of liberty, enchaining her irretrievably under the tyranny of Russia.

From 1840 to 1852 England was engaged in quelling periodic wars in her Indian possessions. In 1841, her army, numbering seventeen thousand men, perished in their retreat from Afghanistan. So with France in Algiers and Morocco. And revolts in Spain were more or less successful.

In 1842, England’s war with China, caused by seizure of opium, resulted in the cession by China of Hong Kong, the freedom of five other ports, and $21,000,000 indemnity.

In 1848, the revolutionary spirit broke out fiercely, and the people made strong leaps for liberty and constitutional government. In France, it overthrew Louis Philippe, establishing a republic, with Louis Napoleon President. In all Europe its echo resounded. Riots in Vienna forced Metternich to flee to England; Ferdinand, to take refuge in the Tyrol and to abdicate in favor of his son, Francis Joseph. Frederick William was compelled by the conditions in Berlin to promise a constitution. The Frankfort Assembly, in 1849, offered Frederick William the title and prerogative of Emperor of Germany, and though, because of his respect for the Hapsburgs, he declined the honor, he still took advantage of the sentiment that prompted the offer to so strengthen the dynasty that later it might be held.

Hungary rose against Austria in 1848, and almost won independence. Kossuth proclaimed Hungary a republic, and Nicholas immediately sent aid to Austria. The Russian army, 130,000 strong, joined the Austrians. The Hungarians retreated to Temesvar, where they were defeated with great slaughter, and Georgy surrendered, August 9, 1849. The name of Haynau, the Austrian commander, is held in execration for his awful cruelty to the conquered.

In the meantime Italy rose. Lombardy drove out the Austrians. Charles Albert, king of Sardinia, had declared war on Austria and crossed the Mincio, April 8, 1848. Radetsky, commanding the Austrians, lost Gorto and yielded Peschiera in May, but in June he forced the Papal troops, who were assisting Charles Albert, to surrender, and completely routed the Italians at Custozza, July 25, and entered Milan. Charles Albert was again defeated by Radetsky at Novari, March 23, 1849, and Venice was captured August 23. Charles Albert resigned his crown to his son, Victor Emmanuel, and died shortly after.

Pope Pius IX. was forced to flee from Rome. Mazzini established the Roman republic in November. Austria, by the close of the summer of 1849, had regained control of her disputed possessions. Louis Napoleon, taking part against Italy, occupied Rome with his troops, July 2, 1849, and drove out Mazzini and Garibaldi.

The Crimean War.—In 1853, Louis Napoleon wanted war. He fomented trouble between the Porte and Nicholas, which ended by a declaration of war by Russia. The Czar claimed and demanded the protectorate of Christians in Turkey. Austria, France, and England opposed the demand. Nicholas had intimated to the British minister at St. Petersburg that England and Russia should share the partition of Turkey,—showing that he was ready to carry out the will and aims of Peter the Great and Catherine. The Russian army was thrown across the Pruth into Moldavia, and was at first worsted by the Turks. In deference to the wishes of Austria and Prussia, Nicholas withdrew his army from the Danubian provinces, and so secured their neutrality. He dislodged the Turkish fleet at Sinope, November 4, 1853.

England and France allied with Turkey and declared war against Russia, March 28, 1854. The allied fleets and troops proceeded to the Black Sea. Sebastopol was the great arsenal of Russia. Twenty-seven thousand English, thirty thousand French, and seven thousand Turks were landed in the Bay of Eupatoria, thirty miles above Sebastopol, September 14, 1854, towards which, five days later, the southerly march began. The allies waded the river Alma under terrific fire from the large Russian army, and won a brilliant victory. The attack was remarkable in that it won victory over superior numbers in seemingly impregnable positions, and in spite of official blunders. Mentschikoff, the Russian general, withdrew the crews from the ships in the harbor and put them, eighteen thousand strong, in command of the batteries. With his own army he marched out of Sebastopol, leaving twenty-five thousand defenders to the city. Admiral Korniloff and his able assistant, Colonel Von Todleben, undertook to strengthen the defenses and to inspire the troops. On October 17, the siege guns of the allies were in position. The English stormed the suburbs of the city, the Malakoff and the Redan; the French stormed the city. Both were unsuccessful. Russian troops poured into Sebastopol, and invited battle outside of the fortifications. At the harbor of Balaklava, Turkish troops recoiled from the Russian advance, and Sir Colin Campbell, with the Highland Brigade, saved the shipping and stores by timely check to the Russians. The battle of Balaklava, October 25, gave the town to the British after stubborn fighting, more than two thirds of the Light Brigade having been sacrificed to Lord Lucan’s misconstruction of orders.

At Inkerman, on November 5, sixty thousand Russians, in fog and rain, surprised the British Household Guards, and for six hours vainly strove to crush them. General Bosquet, with the genius of the soldier, guessed the point of severest attack, and sent reinforcements to the Guards. The Russians were finally driven back. Little good resulted from these two stubborn battles. Winter put an end to active operations. Rain, hurricanes, insufficient shelter, lack of supplies, and extreme cold produced fearful misery among the soldiers. Russia suffered as severely as did the allies, besides having had her fleet on the Black Sea destroyed and her army beaten.

In April, 1855, the bombardment began again. In May the allies captured Kertch and Yenikale, thus cutting off Russian supplies from the Caucasian provinces. In June, Marshal Pelissier succeeded Canrobert and successfully stormed Manelon; and, after the abortive attacks, June 18, of the French on the Malakoff and the English on the Redan, General Simpson succeeded Lord Raglan. August 16, the Russians crossed Tchernaya, but were repulsed by the French. On September 8 the French carried the Malakoff; the British failed to carry the Redan. The Russians set fire to the city and ships and retired to the northern part of the harbor, where they held strongly intrenched positions opposite the allied armies and beyond the reach of the allied fleets. Russia was driven from the Black Sea, had lost her prestige in the Baltic Sea, Bomarsund, on the Aland islands, and the arsenal of Sweaborg, in the Gulf of Finland. She had saved Cronstadt, and, at terrible sacrifice, had captured Kars from the English General Williams with his army of Turks. Her vast territory was comparatively intact. The nations were not satisfied. The Peace of Paris increased the prestige of Louis Napoleon; it postponed the Eastern Question by putting the Christian subjects under the nominal protection of the Powers, but virtually under that of the Sultan. The treaty of peace was signed March 30, 1856.

Wars in the East.—In 1857, the Indian Mutiny was caused by the introduction of Enfield rifles. Delhi was taken after desperate fighting, September 20. Cawnpore and Lucknow were the theatre of horrible scenes. The rebellion was finally crushed in 1859.

In the meantime war with Persia was begun and ended by the recapture of Herat, in Afghanistan. In December, 1857, England and France made war on China and captured Canton. They secured many concessions by the Treaty of Tien Tsin, and $2,000,000 indemnity.

War between Austria, France, and Sardinia.—In 1859, Louis Napoleon made a secret alliance with Italy. General disarmament was proposed. Sardinia agreed to it; Austria stood aloof. On April 25, 1859, Austria ordered the disarmament of Piedmont. On the 27th, King Victor Emmanuel proclaimed war. On the 30th, French troops were in Turin. On May 13, Louis Napoleon himself disembarked at Genoa, where he was met by Victor Emmanuel. The Austrian forces crossed the Ticino, en route for Milan, but hesitated, because of the French advance. The opening battles at Montebello and Balestro, May 20, 30, and 31, were favorable to the allies.

CAPTURE OF THE MALAKOFF.

At Magenta, June 4, the Austrians met with terrible defeat. The forces of the allies numbered 55,000, and their loss was 4000; the Austrian army of 75,000 lost 10,000 killed and wounded and 7000 prisoners. The conquerors entered Milan on June 8. Francis Joseph fell back to the line of the Mincio, and at Solferino the decisive battle of the campaign was fought on June 24. Napoleon commanded the allied armies, which numbered about 150,000; they fought for sixteen hours against the Austrian force of 170,000, gaining a fearful victory. This battle cost Austria 20,000 men; the French lost in killed and wounded 12,000 and the Sardinians 5000 men.

The allies crossed the Mincio and laid siege to Peschiera, but while all Europe expected another fight, an armistice of five weeks was agreed to, and Napoleon, unknown to his ally, met Francis at Villafranca and made a peace, upon which was based the Treaty of Zurich, signed November 10. Austria gave Lombardy to Napoleon for the king of Sardinia, as also the fortresses of Mantua and Peschiera. Italy was to become a confederation, with the Pope as president, of which Austria was to be a member, because of her holdings in Venetia. Tuscany and Modena were to be restored to their princes. Garibaldi’s brilliant conquest of Sicily and Naples, in 1860, and Sardinia’s growing power, startled Europe, but the nations dared not interfere. The general parliament of Italy met in 1861, at Turin, and made Victor Emmanuel king of Italy. Rome, under the Pope, and Venetia, under Austria, were as yet dismembered from “Young Italy.”

War with Denmark.—Christian IX. succeeded to the throne of Denmark November 15, 1863. He endeavored to incorporate Schleswig with Denmark; the German population repudiated him and appealed to the Confederacy. The Diet sent troops into Holstein. Bismarck induced Austria to join Prussia in setting aside the London treaty of 1853, and the allied troops forced the Danes back to the intrenchments of Duppel. The capture of Duppel by the Prussians, April 18, proved the efficiency of needle guns and rifled cannon. June 22, the allies crossed the channel to the Island of Alsen and, on the 28th, captured the Danish stronghold Dennewerke, hitherto considered impregnable. The Treaty of Vienna, October 30, 1864, closed the war. Prussia and Austria together were to control the duchies.

The Seven Weeks’ War.—The arrangement between Prussia and Austria respecting the Danish duchies caused the “Seven Weeks’ War” of 1866. Bismarck induced Victor Emmanuel to form an alliance against Austria, March 27. The Prussians, on June 7, without a blow forced the Austrians to retire from Holstein, ignoring the protest of the Federal Diet. Austria was not prepared for war. Her army, together with that of Saxony, amounted to two hundred and seventy-one thousand. With Prussia, fully equipped and on a war footing with three armies, besides the reserves, the grand total estimated at three hundred thousand, the result was a foregone conclusion. Prussia declared war, June 15, 1866, against Hanover, Hesse, and Saxony, and next day threw her armies into the hostile states. On the 17th Francis Joseph published his war manifesto. Italy declared war, on the 20th, against Austria and Bavaria. In fourteen days Prussia’s immense army was mobilized. In five days the northern states to the Main were disarmed, and the Saxon army was forced to retreat toward Bohemia.

BATTLE OF MAGENTA.

General Benedek was commander of the Austrians. Upon news of Prussian victories, he advised Francis Joseph to make terms of peace with William. Prussia fought for German unification; Austria to protect her pride. It was supposed the Austrians would first enter Saxony and dispute the Prussian advance, but Bismarck had determined the war should be brief, for Prussia was now master of the situation. On June 23, the Prussian army marched from three points towards Josephstadt, where Benedek was preparing to fight. On the 27th the Austrians were driven back at Soor, next day at Skalitz, and on the 29th at Gitschen. Archduke Leopold, on the 28th, and Count Clam Gallas, at Gitschen, both attacked the enemy in disobedience of orders, and thus forced Benedek to fall back from his strongest position towards Königgratz. The Austrians were also defeated, on the 28th, at Königinhof and Schweinschadel, and their loss by this time numbered over thirty-five thousand. Benedek asked permission to retreat into Moravia and await reinforcements, but news of the Austrian victory over the Italians at Custozza reached Vienna, and immediately battle was enjoined upon Benedek. Benedek placed five hundred guns in position, spanning a league between the Elbe and Bistritz.

On July 2, the king of Prussia assumed command of the Prussian hosts and ordered attack for the next day. The Crown Prince, several miles away with his army, received orders at four o’clock in the morning of the 3d to advance his Silesian army from Königinhof. At eight o’clock, Prince Frederick Charles, with a hundred thousand, attacked the Austrian centre lying against Sadowa. General Herwarth, with four hundred thousand men, attacked the Austrian right. The whole Austrian army was hurled against these two commands for five hours. Prince Frederick Charles forced passage through the Bistritz and took Sadowa, but could not take the heights. At one o’clock retreat was being considered, but the Crown Prince coming up with his troops the heights were taken at four o’clock. The fighting on both sides in this battle was determined and heroic. The Prussian loss was over ten thousand, and the Austrians lost twenty-seven thousand killed and wounded, nineteen thousand prisoners, with 174 cannon and 11 colors. At Lissa, on July 20, the Austrian navy destroyed the Italian fleet. July 22, an armistice of four weeks was granted. The Peace of Prague was concluded August 23. Her defeat cost Austria Venetia and the quadrilateral, namely, the fortresses of Peschiera, Mantua, Verona, and Legnano, deprived her of any part in Germany or German affairs, and Holstein and Schleswig, and obliged her to pay 40,000,000 thalers, one half of which she was to retain in lieu of the duchies.

Austria emerged from the “Seven Weeks’ War” with her ideas somewhat liberalized, and though her territory was diminished her progress and prosperity increased. The dual-Austro-Hungarian empire was formed by Francis Joseph, he ruling at Vienna as Emperor of Austria and at Buda Pesth as king of Hungary. This war also ended the Germanic confederation of 1815, and the North German Confederation under Prussia arose.

At the peace of Vienna, October 3, Austria recognized the kingdom of Italy, and with the acquisition of Venetia and the quadrilateral fortresses the “Seven Weeks’ War” had greatly helped on the cause of “United Italy.”

In April, 1864, Louis Napoleon sent an army of twenty-five thousand to sustain the Austrian Archduke Maximilian on the throne of Mexico. At that time the United States was occupied with the Civil War. This ended, Napoleon was summarily required to withdraw his forces from the American continent, which he did. Maximilian was thus left to his fate, and, after being condemned by court martial, was shot at Querétaro, June 19, 1867.

The Franco-Prussian War.—Prince Leopold, of Hohenzollern, was offered the throne of Spain after Isabella had fled from Madrid. Leopold declined, but Napoleon demanded that the Emperor William should guarantee never to permit Leopold to accept. William refused to accede to the demand, and Napoleon, urged by the war party, declared war July 19, 1870. On the same day the Confederation placed its forces in the hands of William, as did the South Germans. This spontaneous uprising of all Germany was unlooked for. Napoleon’s army numbered three hundred and ten thousand men. In ten days William had nearly half a million soldiers ready to march against the enemy. August 2, the first fight took place at Saarbrücken, a little town over the German frontier. Napoleon and the young Prince Imperial were present, and the force of Uhlans was driven back. August 4, the Crown Prince of Prussia drove the right wing of MacMahon’s army back at Weissenburg, and on the 6th, again was MacMahon defeated at Wörth. The Germans, having separated MacMahon’s army, advanced into Alsace. In the meantime General Steinmetz carried Spicheren by storm, and the whole German army went forward. Together with the Crown Prince, Steinmetz, on the 14th of August, defeated Marshal Bazaine, at Courcelles, who retreated to Metz, and then endeavored to push on with his hundred thousand men to Chalons. Von Moltke hurried on the Crown Prince to intercept Bazaine, and at Mars la Tour was fought the fiercest battle, so far, of the war. On either side the losses amounted to seventeen thousand. Gravelotte was fought, on August 18, between the armies of Steinmetz and the Crown Prince, King William commanding in person. The battle lasted all day between two hundred thousand Germans and one hundred and eighty thousand French. The Germans lost twenty thousand men, and succeeded in forcing Bazaine into Metz. Although, in one sort, an undecisive battle, Gravelotte perhaps settled the fate of the Empire. MacMahon’s plan was, with his one hundred and twenty-five thousand men reorganized at Chalons, to prevent the German advance on Paris. He was overruled and sent to the relief of Bazaine. Defeated in several small fights, MacMahon was obliged to fall back on Sedan. The heights and ridges above Sedan once occupied by hostile troops, surrender or annihilation was the outcome. MacMahon was wounded, then Ducrot, and the command fell to Wimpffen. Sedan was forced to surrender, September 1, and Napoleon himself gave his sword to King William. Paris was maddened. The Empress escaped to England. Napoleon was taken to the castle of Wilhelmshöhe.

A month had hardly passed since the outbreak of the war, and one of the two great French armies with the Emperor had been captured; the other was besieged in Metz. Gambetta and other prominent men in Paris set up the government of the national defense. A republic was proclaimed. The defense of Paris was zealously undertaken. Large supplies of provisions were gathered. Fortifications were strengthened. The siege began September 19, 1870, and ended January 28, 1871. The direst famine attended it. Gambetta left Paris in a balloon, and at Tours succeeded in forming the army of the Loire and the army of the North. Both were defeated. Strasbourg was captured, and Metz surrendered with a hundred and seventy-three thousand men, among them three marshals of France. The entire German loss in this war was 129,700 men.

January 17, 1871, Thiers was elected President of the Third Republic. Knowing the impossibility of further resistance, with half a million German soldiers, flushed and inspired by constant success, on the soil of France, and Paris in their anaconda coils, he counseled that peace be asked. Thiers, Favre, and Picard negotiated with William and Bismarck. An armistice of twenty days was permitted, that the National Convention then at Bordeaux might ratify terms. In the meantime the house of Hohenzollern reached the summit of its gratified ambition, when, on March 18, William was crowned at Versailles, Emperor of Germany. The cession of Alsace and Lorraine, and $1,000,000,000 indemnity, was the price of peace.

No patriot name in all history deserves more reverence than that of Louis Adolphe Thiers. Upon him devolved the task of making peace with the German foe, of quelling the civil war, and of so managing the finances of France, that her people within two years were enabled, to the astonishment of the world, to pay the enormous indemnity extorted by the Germans, and, by September, 1873, the last franc was paid and the last German sentinel removed from the soil of France.

The civil war between the Republic and the Commune settled the question once for all, that Paris, accountable for all the errors and vicissitudes of the country, is not France, and there is every reason to hope that out of the unequaled horrors of those awful days of carnage the republican government of France arose to remain in perpetuity.

Garibaldi, taking advantage of the fall of Louis Napoleon, and caring not for the king’s promises, took possession with his troops of the city of Rome, September 20, 1870, and on July 2 of the next year Victor Emmanuel erected his throne in the Quirinal.

Turco-Russian War.—In 1875, the Bosnians, Turkish subjects, revolted. They maintained their struggle, and the enraged Turks sent Mohammedan troops among the defenseless Bulgarians, destroying unnumbered thousands of men, women, and children. Czar Alexander declared war April 1, 1877. His army crossed the Balkans and occupied Shipka Pass. Osman Pasha developed unexpected military genius and skill. For five months he checked the onward march of the Russians and won world-wide admiration by his defense of Plevna. By the first of December Plevna was invested completely by the Russians. Driven back whenever attempting to make a sortie, starvation compelled Osman to surrender with forty-four thousand troops. Adrianople was occupied. The Treaty of San Stefano was wrested in sight of Constantinople. It greatly reduced Turkish power in Europe, and constituted Russia heir to Turkey in Europe. Bulgaria was to be protected by fifty thousand Russian troops for two years and to have a Christian governor.

Three months later, England formed a secret treaty with Turkey, securing Cyprus and agreeing to protect Turkey in Asia. Austria, too, was dissatisfied, and the treaty of Berlin was made in 1878, to rectify the balances of the nations. Russia was by this treaty damaged in prestige and, shorn of triumphs, was given only Asiatic provinces. Turkey was stripped of all real power in Europe.

LOUIS ADOLPHE THIERS.

Chino-Japanese War.—In Japan’s declaration of war against China, August 1, 1894, she set forth succinctly the provocation forcing her to this action. She said that Korea had been brought into the notice of the nations of the world by her efforts; that China constantly had interfered with Korea’s government, insistently posing as her suzerain; that when an insurrection in Korea broke out China sent troops into Korea, and that when Japan, under the treaty of 1885, also sent troops to assist Korea to quell the rebels, asking China’s coöperation in the effort, China refused her rightful demand; that China’s course tended to keep up the trouble indefinitely, so that the only course left for Japan was to declare war.

As with Germany a score of years previously, when the time came Japan was ready, not only with munitions of war, but with better topographical knowledge of the enemy’s country than they themselves possessed. The Emperor, whose dynasty antedates the Christian era, gave his people a constitution, and stretching his hand towards Korea he helped her in the same direction. He had Japan’s army and her navy drilled by expert European officers. Arsenals and extensive manufactories for the implements of war were started, with European superintendents. The latest and best of ships were both bought at foreign marts and made at home. Her students were to be found in the universities of the world. Her agents were sent to study in their capitals the economy of every government and the machinery of their executive departments. To find the best and assimilate it seemed the principle of her progression, so that both in military skill and the knowledge of diplomacy she acquired the ability to hold her place among the nations of the civilized world. A war alone was needed to prove that this was a fact.

Japan’s navy consisted of four armored cruisers and eight vessels of 3000 tons each. This was a much lighter fleet than that of China, but swifter. China’s navy had been trained by an able English naval chief, Captain Lang. Her outfit of ships was, perhaps, superior to that of Japan, consisting of five armored vessels, nine protected cruisers, and torpedo boats besides. The principal battle of this Chino-Japanese war was fought on September 15 at Ping Yang, an old capital of Korea, situated at the meeting of several roads. The Japanese landed troops at Gensan, on the northeast, and at Hwang-jo, on the northwest, coast of Korea. These formed the right and left wings of the army whose centre, under General Nodju, advanced from Seoul, about one hundred miles to the south, of which the Japanese were already in possession. Only one wing of the army met opposition in its march, a small battle having been fought. The forces, so far as we can learn, were between twenty and thirty thousand of Chinese and between thirty and forty thousand of Japanese. Japan’s twenty-four years of scientific preparation, her study of the art of war, the practicability of her strategic movements,—admired by the soldiers of the world,—left China, with her old semi-barbarian methods, no chance for victory.

The battle was a bloody one; the defeated Chinese fled until they were on the other side of the Yalu River, in Manchooria. Seven hundred (some accounts say fourteen thousand) Chinese were captured, two thousand killed and wounded. The army continued fighting and conquering until practically the province of Manchooria was in Japan’s possession, as well as the peninsula of Liaotung, terminating with Port Arthur.

The battle of Yalu, or Hai Yun Tao, afforded the first practical test of modern vessels, guns, and projectiles in Asiatic waters. Ping Yang has been called China’s Sedan, and Yalu, Japan’s Trafalgar. Japan had nine cruisers and two converted cruisers wherewith to fight twelve Chinese warships and four torpedo boats. It is said that Japan used melanite shells. The fleet of Chinese warships, convoying transports with ten thousand troops, entered the Yalu River. The next day, September 17, the Japanese fleet, under Admiral Ito, went out to meet them. A European officer on a Chinese vessel says: “Passing along the Chinese line, the Japanese poured as heavy a fire as they could bring to bear upon each ship in succession, and, while they had sea-room, circled round their opponents. The Japanese state that no Japanese war-ship was lost and only three seriously injured.” A Chinese officer says: “As soon as the Chinese on the port side had brought their guns to bear and had obtained range accurately, the Japanese would work around and attack the starboard side.” Four ships were destroyed and two badly injured. One of the Chinese ships was said to have been hit two hundred times. The Chinese ironclads that escaped were later sunk off Wei Hai Wei. Port Arthur, captured October 21, was filled to overflowing with ammunition, grain, and other supplies.

China made three informal overtures for peace. Finally, Li Hung Chang went from Tientsin to Shimonoseki, to make terms, on the 19th of March, 1895. By the treaty there made, May 17, China recognized the independence and autonomy of Korea, ceded certain territory in Manchooria, all the islands in the eastern part of the bay of Liaotung and the northern part of the Yellow Sea, Formosa, and all islands belonging to it, and the Pescadores group. Two hundred million Kuping taels were exacted as indemnity, to be paid in eight installments, one every six months. The inhabitants were to sell out and leave, or in two years to be Japanese subjects. Russia, Germany, and France recommended that Japan should not permanently possess the peninsula of Feng Tan, and Japan agreed to their suggestions.

CAVALRY CHARGE AT GRAVELOTTE. (A. DE NEUVILLE.)

BATTLE OF YALU RIVER.

Formosa, as a strategetical post, is of the greatest value. Korea and Japan now control absolutely the Japan Sea. It was only after four months of fighting that Japan completely conquered the Formosans and had all her new possessions under her control.

China paid Japan an additional $30,000,000 for the release of Port Arthur and Liaotung peninsula. China was well pleased. But in April, 1897, Russia herself had obtained possession of Port Arthur and Talien Wan, and in December the Germans received Kaio Chao, the finest naval station of the province of Shantung. France subsequently obtained Kwang-Chau, the best port of Wangsi; and England, though not joining these powers in the demand in favor of China in 1895, obtained Wei Hai Wei in 1897.

Greco-Turkish War.—In 1895, the fearful atrocities committed by the “unspeakable” Turk began to assume appalling proportions. During three years one hundred thousand Cretans were murdered. February 8, 1897, the Cretans proclaimed union with Greece. The Greeks, unable longer to endure the sufferings of their kindred, determined to help them.

Prince George left for Crete with a torpedo flotilla February 10; Colonel Vassos, aide-de-camp to the king, followed with fifteen hundred men and two batteries on the 13th. Prince Nicholas led a regiment of artillery to the Thessalian frontiers. The powers sent a collective note of protest to Greece, but it was not heeded. Colonel Vassos landed in Crete on the 14th. Sailors from the fleet of the powers occupied the coast towns of Crete. Pasha Berovitch resigned and returned to Constantinople. Greek reserves rallied promptly. Volunteers offered. Colonel Vassos established headquarters in the mountainous interior at Sphakia.

March 18, the powers blockaded Crete. On the 27th, Crown Prince Constantine proceeded to the Turkish frontier. On April 5, the powers declared no gain should accrue to the combatant who approached Thessalian borders. April 8, three thousand Greeks crossed near Krania, began fighting, and were driven back. On April 17 Turkey declared war. On the 18th, a battle of twenty-four hours, in Milouna Pass, crowned Turkish arms with victory. Another hard fought battle, at Reveni, discomfited the Greeks. Greeks passed the Arta River and Greek ironclads bombarded Prevessa. On the 19th, the Turks were in Thessaly and the Greeks in retreat to Larissa. After terrific battles Tornavo and Larissa, on the 25th, fell into the hands of the Turks. Colonel Smolenski fought desperately at Valestino, but had to yield; and Volo also fell to the Turks. The Turks occupied Pharsaos on May 6. Greece asked the powers for peace, May 8; Cretan autonomy was agreed to, and Turkey permitted armistice on the 15th. The war closed. Turkey was forced to yield all Thessalian territory, and Crete was relieved of Turkish oppression. Greece was forced to withdraw all support from Crete and pay $20,000,000 indemnity.

The remarkable feature of this war was the intensely hard fighting from start to close, and the disposition of the powers to assist Turkey by interfering with the Grecian navy. Frequently the Austrians helped the Turks by placing their guns in position. It was only when the Sultan conquered Thessaly and threatened to keep it that the powers interposed.

The crime committed by the powers against civilization and Christianity by their action seems incredible, even though the peace of Europe was thereby secured.

England’s Wars in the Soudan.—The Khedive of Egypt had obtained great loans from Europe. England and France took financial control of the country. Arabi Pasha inaugurated a rebellion and fortified Alexandria. Many Europeans were murdered, and England bombarded the city, taking possession July 12, 1882. General Wolseley, at Tel el Kebir, September 13, fought and defeated Arabi, who fled leaving two thousand dead. France withdrew from the financial arrangement. The English remained to put the Egyptians in condition for self-government. England has remained ever since.

Mohammed Ahmed arose in the Soudan, proclaiming himself El Mahdi, the Mussulman Messiah. The barbarian hordes flocked to his banner. He defeated the Egyptians in four engagements, October, 1883. The Anglo-Egyptian force of ten thousand men, under General Hicks, was destroyed, only two escaping. General Gordon was sent to the relief of the Egyptian army. He reached Khartoum, February 18, 1884. The Mahdists besieged the city. Gordon sent for reinforcements. England was so slow in sending them that they arrived two days too late. Khartoum was captured through treachery, and Gordon, the most beloved of English soldiers for his saintly and heroic character, was put to death on January 27, 1885.

General Sir Horatio Herbert Kitchener was made Sirdar in 1890. He started from Cairo with one thousand British and fifteen thousand Egyptians, black and fellah troops, building a road across the desert as he advanced, and engineering his gunboats up the Nile. The distance from his base, at Cairo, to his first storehouse, at Wady Halfa, is eight hundred miles. April 8, 1898, was fought the battle of Atbara, a fort at the point where the Atbara River enters the Nile. Here Mahmud, the commander of the barbarians, was captured and his army of twelve thousand infantry destroyed. Osman Digna got away with the greater part of the cavalry, numbering four thousand.

The force was about a month reaching Wady Hamed, and, September 1, was in sight of Omdurman. The Sirdar’s line was drawn up in crescent form, with Omdurman and Khartoum for its centre. In this position was fought the first battle of Egeda, in which twenty-two thousand of the Dervishes fell. The Khalifa and Osman Digna fled with a scant handful of followers, and are now said to be bandits in the Kordofan. The number of the annihilated army of the Mahdists will never be known. The British loss of whites was less than two hundred, and the native loss less than three hundred. The fire of the barbarians was generally too high to effect great injury. September 2 will be a marked day in England’s calendar. The Sirdar marched into Khartoum, the Union Jack was raised, and beneath its floating crosses his chaplains performed Gordon’s funeral ceremonies on the spot where he was slain nearly fourteen years before.

The Boer War.—By the treaty of 1881 Great Britain claimed suzerainty over the South African (Transvaal) Republic and Orange Free State. These Republics claimed that by the treaty of 1884 Great Britain gave up her claim of suzerainty. Here arose an issue which was aggravated by the discovery of diamonds at Kimberley and of gold at Johannesburg, followed by the Jameson raid, which, shorn of its disguise, was notice to the Boers that Great Britain desired and designed to occupy and absorb their two Republics. The diplomatic war went on for years between President Kruger, of the Transvaal, and Mr. Chamberlain, Great Britain’s Colonial Secretary. It culminated in an ultimatum on the part of Kruger, on October 9, 1899, which Chamberlain rejected. Both sides had been preparing for this, and on October 11, the outbreak of the war, Great Britain had already an army of 25,000 men in South Africa, while the Boers had mobilized an equal, if not superior, army of effectives. The Boers immediately invaded Natal and Cape Colony, shutting up General White and his army in Ladysmith, and Colonel Powell and his forces in Mafeking. Kimberley was also besieged. The initial battles were numerous, fierce, and generally favorable to the Boers. Great Britain’s eyes were speedily opened to the gravity of the situation. She hurried large reinforcements to the scene till her armies far outnumbered those of the Boers. Yet her best generals, as Buller at Tugela River, and Methuen, at Magersfontein, continued to meet with disastrous defeats. Lord Roberts, in connection with General Kitchener, was sent, January 10, 1900, to supersede the blundering generals, and to organize a new campaign. It was seen that direct battle against the Boers was bound to end in defeat. So Roberts was provided with an overwhelming army, estimated at 225,000, and he at once entered upon a war of strategy. His northward advance was general along his lines, thus keeping the Boers divided. He flanked them out of their strongholds. By February he had invaded the Orange Free State, and raised the siege of Kimberley. On February 27 he captured General Cronje and his force of 4000 men, and on March 13 took possession of Bloemfontein, the Free State capital, whence he issued a proclamation annexing the republic under the name of Orange River Colony. On February 28 the siege of Ladysmith was raised, and shortly after that of Mafeking. The Boers continued to fight doggedly, all the while inflicting heavy losses on their enemy, but resistance was futile against such overwhelming odds. They were gradually forced from one position to another in the direction of Pretoria, the Transvaal capital. On March 5 Presidents Kruger and Steyn joined in peace proposals, which were rejected. On March 12 they made an appeal to the nations for mediation. All refused to mediate. On March 27 the Boers lost their ablest general in the person of General Joubert, who died at Pretoria. By May 12 Kroonstad, the second Free State capital, had fallen into Lord Roberts’ hands. The Vaal River was then crossed and the Transvaal invaded. On May 31 the British army entered the important town of Johannesburg, and hastened toward Pretoria, which was captured on June 5, 1900. President Kruger and General Botha had left a few days before, the former in the direction of the Portuguese port of Lorenzo Marques, the latter with the remnant of the Boer army to the mountains beyond Pretoria. On September 3 Lord Roberts declared the Transvaal annexed to Great Britain under the name of the Vaal River Colony. Generals Botha and De Wet continued a guerrilla warfare far past the end of the century. President Kruger accepted the protection of Holland, and sailed thither on October 20, 1900. Lord Roberts arrived in England in December, 1900, to receive his honors. At the turn of the century the South African problem was a most wearying one for Great Britain.

The Boxer Uprising.—The defeat of China by Japan in 1894, the ambition of European powers to occupy her ports and enlarge their “spheres of influence,” the ominous threats to partition her territory, soured the Manchu dynasty and the people of northern China against foreigners. The Empress Dowager deposed the young Emperor, seized the reins of government, and catered to that reactionary and hostile spirit which culminated in the “Boxer” uprising. These mobs began the destruction of missions, the murder and expulsion of missionaries, and concerted attack against everything that savored of foreign direction and influence. The Chinese regular soldiers were either helpless before them or in sympathy with them. By May, 1900, all the powers represented at Peking stood aghast at the startling fact that their respective legations were beleaguered in Peking, and liable to be murdered. Warships were instantly ordered to Taku. By June 1, 1900, twenty-three vessels had reported,—nine Russian, three British, three German, three French, two American, two Japanese, one Italian. A force of 2000 soldiers was landed from these, and immediately started for Peking, under command of the British Rear-Admiral Seymour, for the rescue of the legations. This force was defeated by the “Boxers,” and compelled to retreat to Tien-Tsin with heavy loss. An attempt to torpedo the Taku harbor was resented by the warships. They bombarded and blew up the Taku forts. In this action the American warships did not participate. The “Boxers” swarmed in Tien-Tsin, and an allied force of 4000 men was sent thither to capture it. In their first attack, on July 9, they were repulsed with heavy loss. Being reinforced up to 7000 men, their second attack, on July 13, was successful. The city was taken, and made the base of further operations against Peking, 80 miles up the Pei-ho. The allies were further reinforced, and started for Peking with an army of 16,000 men. They met the Chinese army of 30,000 men at Pei-Tsang, and after a severe battle on August 5, drove them from their fortifications with great loss. The Chinese rallied at Yang-Tsun, but were again defeated by the allies on August 6. They offered no further serious resistance to the allies, who moved swiftly on Pekin, invested it, and, on August 14, breached its walls and entered it in triumph. The legations were relieved after an imprisonment of nearly three months. Two ministers, one of Japan, the other of Germany, had been murdered. The others had escaped death only by concentrating and defending themselves in the English compound. The allied forces occupied the city for a time, and then those of Russia and the United States withdrew, leaving a strong legation guard. The Chinese government appointed Li-Hung-Chang and Prince Ching ministers to meet ministers of the powers to arrange terms of settlement. After months of conference a protocol was signed in January, 1901, which was supposed to contain the germs of future settlement. But there was that in the Chinese situation which was bound to tax the diplomacy of the world during many years of the twentieth century.

A Review of Martial Results.—The history of the world shows that successful war adds to the glory and prestige of the victorious nation, and this is particularly exemplified by the wars of the nineteenth century. France, so long victorious, dazzled the world. At Waterloo, her glory was clouded. Napier, in his closing words of the history of these events of the twenty years of war and turmoil, showed how thoroughly the English people appreciated that their greatness and power were due to the glory achieved by the arms of Britain’s chivalrous sons.

While England was covering herself with glory, her offspring, the United States, was teaching her, in the war of 1812, that being now of age his pockets were not again to be turned inside out, a lesson which thereafter she heeded.

Greece, throbbing with the impulse of freedom, achieved her independence, displaying all the heroism of her Hellenic ancestry.

The Mexican war added greatly to the glory of American arms and resulted in the acquisition of a vast territory, whose inhabitants quickly assimilated themselves to the requirements of American citizenship.

The Revolution of ’48 but served to consolidate the power of Prussia, laying the foundation for the Imperial crown to rest upon the head of her king, while fitting France for her future solid republican career.

The Crimean war, except that it checked the policy of Russia, produced few results in comparison with the vast amount of blood and treasure so lavishly spent.

The victories of Magenta and Solferino illumined again the eagles of France. The “Seven Weeks’ War,” while still further consolidating Germany under Prussia, was not without its blessings for Austria, and advanced “Young Italy” greatly toward the goal of her ambition.

In America, the appeal to arms was made to decide the questions mooted since the nation’s birth. One effect of this war was to show the wonderful prowess and soldierly qualities of the American citizen.

The Franco-Prussian war lifted the dignity of Hohenzollern to its height, ended forever the Empire of France in a crushing fall, and taught the lesson of scientific preparation for war, than which no science is more worthy of intense study and application in all its branches.

The Chino-Japanese war was a triumph of a growing civilization over semi-barbarism, and foreshadows the prominent rôle that Japan may be called upon to play in the twentieth century. The enlargement of her territory was a fitting reward for her unselfish championing of her weaker sister, Korea.

The Greco-Cretan-Turkish war shed no glory on the Turkish nor on the so-called Christian nations, and will stand on history’s page as a crowning shame to European civilization.

The opening of Africa by General Kitchener and his great achievements read like old-time stories, and the twentieth century may see great results in Africa from this wonderful campaign.

The war of the United States with Spain, fought because it was impossible longer to allow the atrocities of her rule on this hemisphere at our very doors, has brought conditions not dreamed of, and which, under the providence of God, may lead to greater results in the development of Christian civilization than we now may comprehend.

The Boer war had little instigation on the part of Great Britain, except greed. Its management reflected no credit on her military genius, weakened her in the eyes of nations, and entailed a loss of life and money from which she will not recover in generations.

The Chinese disturbance did not rise to the dignity of war, but opened problems of startling intricacy and moment for all the powers.

---

THE CENTURY’S FAIRS AND EXPOSITIONS
By GEORGE J. HAGAR,
Editor of Appendix to Encyclopædia Britannica.

Dr. Alfred Russell Wallace, in a recent work, argues that the nineteenth century is altogether unique in that it inaugurated a new era. To grasp its marvelous achievements, he tells us, it should be compared with a long historical period, rather than with another century, however happily selected. The progress it environs is set down as almost wholly material and intellectual, and the palm for completeness is given to the material. Debatable as his conclusion may be, there can be no dispute either as to the qualitative or quantitative progress in the material advancement of mankind in the century now closing. In the present retrospect the broader view becomes apparent,—that the material and the intellectual have been allied forces that have constantly pushed forward side by side, one devising in the solitude that genius needs for expansion, the other showing to the world the realizations of thought that in practical application benefit all.

The evolution of the international exposition of to-day is a conspicuous result of this material and intellectual wedlock. It seems a long time between the fair that was held to allow people not closely settled to purchase the ordinary commodities of life, food, clothing, and household belongings, and the great expositions to which the nations of the world bring the surpassing embodiments of native thought. Measured by years, the time is really beyond computation; but measured by results, mere time is annihilated, and the progress that the evolution illustrates is found to have kept a steady pace with man’s physical necessities and intellectual growth. The moment Necessity has shown that mankind needed something to make life brighter, happier, or more comfortable to pass through, Intellect has undertaken the task of creating it and has fashioned out the Material.

In the great expositions of to-day are seen the effects of the marvelous influence which sprang from the fair as a market, instituted so long ago that no call for the records is answerable. Of this kind, only a very few remain. Then came the fair designed to promote the useful arts and manufactures; the fair to advance agriculture and allied industries; and the fair to show special articles, to commemorate historical events, and to aid interests of large public concern. Under an ever-increasing expansion, stimulated by popular favor, the fair, with the commercial feature abandoned or having it only as a restricted branch, became the exhibition to show a larger development of the arts, sciences, and mechanical trades; to celebrate great public occurrences on a grander scale than earlier fairs had done; to promote special industries, local or national; to aid education by permanent displays of natural or manufactured products; and to promote the commercial intercourse of the world. From the first of this class of exhibitions came the international undertakings, first known as world’s fairs, and afterward as international exhibitions and expositions. In some one of these classes may be found every kind of a display of products, irrespective of its purpose or individual name.

The development of the modern exhibition from the early fair has been confined to no one country nor people. Everywhere the purpose and process have been the same. A few years changed the old-time mart, where people went to buy what they knew they would find, to the convenient place where tradesmen placed on view the things they knew people would need and buy, as well as articles offered at a venture that people who really didn’t need them might be tempted to purchase because of novelty or other quality. Thus, the bargain counter and the department store are several hundred years older than the thrifty housewife of to-day reckons.

Trade competition, then as now, led to a broadening of plans, rival efforts, and special attractions. People began to attend fairs to see what was new, as well as to buy; and soon, lest they should tire of sightseeing, it became necessary to provide means for entertaining them. Punch and Judy came on the scene with perennial popularity. Jugglery astounded the young and fascinated their elders. Dancing and wrestling rings proved sportive magnets of annually increasing strength. The fair now began to change from a strictly commercial undertaking to an occasion for holiday hilarity, and soon trade and amusement were struggling for the mastery. In many places, hilarity led to excesses, and excesses to crime. Public opinion demanded the forceful intervention of the law, and one by one the most demoralizing fairs were suppressed, the notorious Donnybrook closing its long career of debauchery and lighting in 1855.

The display of merchandise and the gathering of customers at the most noted fairs in time became really enormous, and for many years the great fairs of the day were held on open and extensive plains. Then, too, the fair assumed an importance that led first the local authorities, and after them higher dignitaries, to seek to turn it to their individual advantage. For a time no fair could be held in Great Britain without a special grant from the crown, and it was a widely observed custom for royal or ecclesiastical authorities to give permission to a town or village that had suffered some misfortune to hold a fair as a means of reestablishing itself. The famous fair of St. Giles’s Hill, near Manchester, England, was instituted as a revenue to the bishop by William the Conqueror. That it was a valuable monopoly is shown by the facts that its jurisdiction extended seven miles around the city, and that all merchants who sold wares within that circuit, unless at the fair, forfeited them to the bishop.

A curious evidence of early international interest in the fair, as well as of its importance and influence, is found in the records of 1314, when King Philip of France sent a formal complaint to King Edward II. of England, to the effect that the merchants of England had ceased frequenting the fairs in his dominions with their wood and other goods, to the great loss of his subjects. Philip entreated Edward to persuade, and, if necessary, to compel, English people to frequent the fairs of France as formerly, promising them all possible security and encouragement.

As a purely commercial institution, the fair had its best day when people were widely separated. The increase of population, the development of new life and activity by growing communities, the opening of means of travel between distant points, and the establishment of stores and markets, were all fatal to the commercial fair. To-day, in all Europe, only three really great annual fairs of this character remain,—those of Nijni-Novgorod, in Russia; Beaucaire, in France; and Leipsic, in Germany. The same conditions that brought the popular usefulness of the commercial fair to an end were the forces from which the fair as an exponent of industrial achievement has been developed, and the material progress of the nineteenth century is to be traced.

MUNICH EXPOSITION, 1854.

For the modern fair in all of its forms the world is indebted to the Society of Arts, of London, an organization whose fame in America was so great that Benjamin Franklin, in soliciting corresponding membership, declared that he would esteem it a great honor to be admitted and also to be permitted to contribute twenty guineas to be expended in premiums. What this Society in its early days did for Great Britain it did also for civilization. It organized the first exhibition of specimens of improvements in the useful arts and manufactures in 1760; stimulated native ingenuity by judicious awards of prizes and premiums for exhibits of exceptional merit; and extended its powerful influence to foster art, science, mechanical and agricultural industry, and the fishery trade and colonial commerce of the country.

Of the many influences of this Society that came to the United States, it may be questioned if any had a more lasting benefit for both people and country than that which gave birth to the mechanics’ institutes. There are people still living who are able to recall how the large cities in the Eastern and Middle States vied with each other in the establishment of two great and kindred institutions—the mechanics’ institute and the apprentices’ library. Philadelphia led the cities in the matter of time, her Franklin Institute being founded in 1824. Four years afterward the American Institute was chartered in New York City. After these came the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics’ Association in Boston, the Maryland Institute in Baltimore, and numerous others,—those mentioned being the principal ones that still maintain annual or other exhibitions. At first, the exhibitions of these institutes, like the first one ever held under the patronage of a national government,—that in Paris in 1798,—were composed of various articles loaned by their owners. Soon, however, the popularity of the institutes and the awarding of prizes and diplomas brought to the exhibitions specimens of the handicraft of members and friends, and the rising lights in the arts and manufactures became eager to secure the recognition of their genius that such awards established. Thus, the influence of the principal surviving institutes has spread far beyond local limits.

Purely national exhibitions have never found much popular favor in the United States. When as a whole people we decide to hold one for a purpose of general interest, we prefer to set a large table and invite the universe to help us celebrate. In France, the first national exhibition was a loan exhibition. Its effect, however, was so immediate that the government repeated it the same year, organized more elaborate ones in 1801 and 1802, and decided to hold them triennially thereafter—a course that has since been interrupted by political exigencies. These exhibitions were projected to illustrate the progress of France only. In the United States there have been no State exhibitions, excepting agricultural fairs, for which outside coöperation has not been invited.

The life of the American agricultural fair is almost measurable by the full century. This, too, had its origin in England. The father of the American system of combined agricultural fairs and cattle shows was Elkanah Watson, a native of Plymouth, Mass., who spent the greater part of his life in promoting large public measures besides agriculture and education. In 1807 he removed from Albany, N. Y., to Pittsfield, Mass., where he engaged in general and experimental agriculture and cattle-raising. His efforts to improve local farming conditions and to raise a superior breed of cattle attracted widespread interest, and this suggested to him that an annual exhibition of cattle and of farm products, resulting from a more painstaking system of cultivation than was commonly followed, would prove of material advantage to the farmer, the breeder, and the general public. Accordingly, he induced his farming friends in the country to contribute specimens of improved breeds of cattle and of superior products of the soil; and the first exhibition or fair was held in 1810. This, with modest prizes for the best exhibits, proved a complete success.

NEW ORLEANS EXPOSITION. 1884.

(Illumination of Horticultural Building on Christmas Night.)

Encouraged by the results of his initial efforts, he went to Boston to solicit pecuniary aid for a second and much larger exhibition. Although he was at that time widely known for his public-spirited philanthropy, and also as the founder of the influential Berkshire Agricultural Society, his appeals for aid brought him little save derision. To show how small concern was felt by business and public men toward the farming industry, a sentence in a letter from ex-President John Adams to Mr. Watson is sufficient:—

“You will get no aid from Boston; commerce, literature, theology, medicine, the university, and universal politics are against you.”

The ex-President was correct in his judgment. Mr. Watson did not receive a single favorable response to his appeals; yet he lost not a particle of faith in the wisdom of his undertaking. With the coöperation only of the farmers in his county, Mr. Watson succeeded in arranging annual exhibitions until 1816, when he returned to Albany. The same year he organized the first agricultural society in the State of New York, and began establishing fairs and cattle shows in the near-by counties. In 1819 he secured the passage of an Act by the Legislature appropriating $10,000 annually for six years for the promotion of agriculture and domestic manufactures, conditional on a like amount being raised by the agricultural societies in the different counties. A State Society was incorporated in 1832, to which county societies were directed to report, while it, in turn, had to render a combined report to the Legislature annually.

Since then an agricultural department has become an indispensable part of the government of the various States and Territories, even of those that are popularly believed to be only metallic producers. The character of the state and county agricultural fair has been undergoing a radical change for many years, especially in sections thickly settled or near large cities, and the chief attractions have passed from the exhibition of sleek domestic animals and choice fruits of the soil to horse-racing and bicycle contests. Innovations foreign to the spirit and intention of the fair have already wrought its ruin in many places and are threatening it generally.

Of American fairs in the original commercial sense, those held during the Civil War, to aid the work of the United States Sanitary Commission on the battlefield and in the camp and hospital, will always be historically conspicuous. During those memorable four years it is doubtful if there was a single city, town, or village in the Northern States that did not put forth a special effort to provide necessities and conveniences for the soldiers and sailors that were not supplied by the government, and the fair was the most popular form of raising the needful money.

Exhibitions of special articles, possessing the features of state, national, and international combinations, and independent of any locality, event, or period of time, are growing in frequency. Many of these have a predominating technical interest,—as the international exhibitions of fisheries and fishery methods, of life-saving methods and apparatus, of forestry products and systems of forest preservation, and of railway appliances; while others combine the technical and popular features, as the exhibitions of electrical apparatus, of improved food preparations, of bicycles, of automobile vehicles, and of wood-working and labor-saving machinery.

Special exhibitions in the United States that possess a large popular interest include the annual showing of the art associations and leagues in the principal cities, and the annual horse, dog, and sportsmen’s shows in New York city. Among them also are to be noted the permanent expositions in Philadelphia and Chicago—both reminders of the greatest international expositions that had been held up to their day. The Philadelphia exposition is held in Memorial Hall, the building erected in Fairmount Park by the State of Pennsylvania at a cost of $1,500,000, and used for the Art Gallery of the Centennial Exposition in 1876. It now contains an art and industrial collection similar to the famous South Kensington Museum in London. The Chicago exposition is in the former Art Palace of the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, and, having been endowed by Marshall Field with $1,000,000, is now known as the Field Columbian Museum. Its most conspicuous feature is a collection showing the development of the railway, and the next, its forestry exhibits. In the line of permanent expositions, Philadelphia is to be credited with two commercial museums of far-reaching influence that will be considered further on.

EIFFEL TOWER. PARIS EXPOSITION, 1888.

The first exhibition of the industries of all nations was that held in Hyde Park, London, in 1851. It was an outgrowth of the annual exhibitions of the Society of Arts, before mentioned, and was at first designed to be only a national enterprise, but on a more extended scale than the former exhibitions of the Society. The late Prince Albert, husband of Queen Victoria, however, conceived the idea of throwing this particular exhibition open to the industry of the world. His suggestion at once met the favor of the Council of the Society, as well as of the leading manufacturers of England and the general public. A royal warrant was procured appointing a commission to “manage an exhibition of the works of industry of all nations,” and of this body Prince Albert became president.

On February 21, 1850, the commissioners felt justified in making a public announcement that the building would cover an area of from sixteen to twenty acres; that it would be ready for the reception of goods by January 1, 1851; and that the exhibition would be opened to the public on May 1, following. The plans for a building submitted by Sir Joseph Paxton were accepted after a large number had been considered. They called for a vast structure of iron and glass, somewhat similar to the great conservatory he had erected for the Duke of Devonshire at Chatsworth. A contract was signed with Messrs. Fox and Henderson for the construction of the building, under which they were to receive £79,800, and the materials of the building were to remain their property. On February 3, the completed structure was formally delivered to the commissioners. It had an extreme length of 1851 feet and an extreme breadth of 408 feet, with an additional projection on the north side, 936 feet long by 48 feet wide.

While the erection of the building was in progress, Dr. Lyon Playfair was chosen to decide and classify the wide range of articles that was sought to be brought together under the general title of “Objects of Industrial and Productive Art.” He arranged these under four great sections: Raw Materials, Machinery, Manufactures, and Fine Arts, and they in turn were divided and subdivided into a vast number of classes and smaller divisions. The collecting of national exhibits was placed in the hands of district committees in all the principal towns and manufacturing localities, and in response to invitations extended to all the British colonies and the various foreign governments, nearly every country in Europe, almost every State in the North American Union, the South American republics, India, Egypt, Persia, and the far-off islands of the seas, sent objects that swelled the total estimated value of exhibits—excluding the renowned Koh-i-noor diamond—to £1,781,929.

The exhibition was opened by Queen Victoria on the appointed day, and was continued till October 11. The total number of exhibitors was about 15,000. During the 114 days the exhibition was open a total of 6,063,986 persons visited it, a daily average of 42,111. The largest number in a single day was on Tuesday of the closing week, 109,915. An attempt to ascertain the number of foreign visitors developed the unexpected result that not much more than 40,000 foreigners visited London beyond the annual average of 15,000. The financial result of the exhibition was really remarkable. The total receipts from all sources amounted to £506,000, and the total expenditures to about £330,000, leaving a surplus of £176,000, which was subsequently increased to £186,436.

The distinctions of all kinds that were awarded, Council and prize medals and “honourable mentions,” aggregated 5084. It is here interesting to note, as showing the truly international character of the first world’s exhibition, that foreign guests occupied two-fifths of the exhibition space and received three-fifths of the honors. British exhibitors of machinery, manufactures in metal, and manufactures in glass and porcelain, took more prizes than all the foreigners combined. Foreigners led in the number of prizes for textile fabrics, fine arts, and miscellaneous manufactures; and in the section of raw materials for food and manufactures the foreign exhibitors gained nearly four times as many prizes as the British.

This exhibition developed a number of features that should be borne in mind when considering those that came after it. It was an experiment in an untried field; it was comprised in a single building; and it was self-supporting. In all respects it was a marvelous achievement. It made the late Prince Consort the “father,” and the Society of Arts the pioneer promoters, of the international exposition.

COURT OF HONOR FROM PERISTYLE.

(World’s Columbian Exposition, Chicago, 1893.)

The beneficial influence of the first world’s exhibition began to be felt immediately. An exhibition of the arts and manufactures of Ireland was held in Cork in the following year, and the Royal Dublin Society, which had been holding similar exhibitions triennially, got up a much larger one than usual, through the generous pecuniary aid of William Dargan, in 1853. The Dublin exhibition, unlike that of Cork, was international in scope.

American visitors to the London exhibition brought home with them a pretty large inspiration for a similar effort, and before the close of 1851 a number of citizens of New York had associated themselves for that purpose. In January, 1852, the corporation of the city of New York granted a lease for five years of Reservoir Square, on the conditions that a building of iron, glass, and wood should be erected thereon, and that the entrance fee to the proposed exhibition should not exceed fifty cents. In March, the Legislature incorporated the Association for the Exhibition of the Industries of all Nations, with a capital of $200,000 that might be increased to $300,000. Subsequently, the Federal Government constituted the building a bonded warehouse and exempted foreign exhibits from the payment of duties.

This exhibition was therefore a private enterprise, having no other official recognition than that mentioned. It was also an unfortunate affair from beginning to end. The location was then three or four miles from the heart of the city; the area was entirely inadequate for the purpose; the day of opening had to be postponed, because of the incomplete condition of the building; and financially the enterprise was a huge failure.

The exhibition was opened July 14, 1853, with much ceremony, although still scarcely half ready for exhibits or visitors, and was continued for 119 days. There were about 4800 exhibitors, somewhat more than one-half being foreign. The total cost of the exhibition was nearly $1,000,000, and the receipts were $340,000. Although a financial failure, and a disappointment in many ways, this first international exhibition in the United States was productive of much good.

The success of the London exhibition also aroused the French to depart from the exclusively national character of their former exhibitions and to inaugurate one open to the world. This was done under the direct auspices of the Imperial Government, which undertook to combine certain features of both the London and the New York enterprises; hence, the first international exhibition held in Paris was practically a private scheme supported by official guarantees. A further departure was here made in the matter of building, and, instead of the single great structure, there were the Palais de l’Industrie, the Palais des Beaux Arts, the Panorama, and three smaller buildings for agricultural implements, carriages, and a variety of less costly articles. Another innovation was here introduced, a partial return to the methods of the commercial fair, in the setting apart of exhibiting spaces on the open ground.

The main building, the Palais de l’Industrie, was erected by a joint-stock company on the Champs Elysées, and provided a floor space of 1,770,000 square feet. It was built of glass, stone, and brick, and was 800 feet long by 350 feet wide. The various buildings cost about $5,000,000, and the Palais de l’Industrie was erected for a permanent structure.

This exhibition was opened on May 15, 1855, and closed on November 15, following. It was visited by 4,533,464 persons. Besides France and her colonies, fifty-three foreign states and twenty-two colonies belonging to them sent exhibits. In all there were 20,839 exhibitors, those of France and her colonies predominating by only about 500. The exhibits were classified on the London plan, there being in each case thirty classes altogether. Excluding the main building, which the Imperial Government acquired, the exhibition cost about $2,250,000.

Between the first and second London exhibitions there were many industrial and art displays in the United Kingdom and colonies and on the Continent, among which should be noted those of New Brunswick and Madras in 1853, Munich in 1854, and Edinburgh and Manchester in 1857.

The second London exhibition was undertaken by a commission headed, as the first, by the Prince Consort, under a guarantee fund of $2,250,000. While it was in course of preparation the Prince Consort died, and for a while a heavy pall hung over the scheme. The commission here introduced the French idea of separate buildings. The site was at South Kensington, and the main structure was built of brick, glass, and iron, was nearly rectangular in shape, and covered an area of about seven acres. With the annexes the total area under roof was about twenty-three acres.

WOMAN’S BUILDING.

(World’s Columbian Exposition, 1893.)

This exhibition was opened by the Duke of Cambridge on May 1, 1862, and remained open for 177 days. It was visited by 6,211,103 persons, a daily average of 36,329, its receipts were wholly absorbed by expenses, and a slight deficit was left. Foreign exhibitors numbered 17,861, and received more than 9000 prizes.

In 1863 the French Government announced that an exhibition would be held in Paris in 1867, that was intended to be more completely universal in character and more comprehensive in plan than any that had ever been held. The Champ de Mars, the great parade-ground on which the Ecole Militaire faced, containing about 111 acres, was placed at the disposal of the commissioners by the Government. In the centre of this space was erected the principal building, an oval structure mainly of iron, 1607 feet long and 1246 feet wide, that cost $2,357,000.

In planning this building the convenience of exhibitors and visitors in ready access to the exhibits of any desired country or class was given the preference over architectural effect. Here, again, was a diffusion of exhibits in detached buildings, and a noteworthy novelty was the reservation of ground on the park surrounding the main building for the erection by foreign exhibitors of special buildings for the display of articles that could not be accommodated in the main structure. This feature became the most popular one of the entire exhibition, for it gave a most graphic illustration of the architecture, manners, customs, and countless peculiarities of the peoples of the world.

The exhibition was opened by the Emperor on April 1, 1867, and was closed on October 31, following. The number of visitors was upward of 15,000,000, a daily average of nearly 70,000, and of exhibitors, 51,819. In all, 12,944 medals and grand prizes of honorable mention were awarded. From beginning to end the expenses were $4,596,764, and the receipts aggregated $2,822,000. The national and municipal governments contributed $1,200,000 each, which added to the receipts of the exhibition proper created a surplus over expenditure of $626,000.

London’s third exhibition, from May 1 till September 30, 1871, was projected as the first of an annual series that should separately promote a distinct branch of industrial effort. Thirty-three foreign countries were represented; there were approximately 4000 art and 7000 industrial exhibitors; and the visitors numbered 1,142,000. The second in the series, in 1872, was confined to printing, paper, music, musical instruments, jewelry, cotton goods, and fine arts; and the third, in 1873, was devoted to the general subject of cookery.

Great as was the universal exposition of Paris in 1867, that at Vienna in 1873 far surpassed it in extent and grandeur, although its pecuniary success was severely affected by an epidemic of cholera, a financial crisis, and local extortions. As each of the preceding international exhibitions had developed a distinctive feature, so this of Vienna introduced the custom of holding world’s congresses for the discussion of great problems of universal application.

The exhibition was opened on May 1 and closed on November 3, following. Turnstiles recorded the entrance of 7,254,687 visitors. There were about 70,000 exhibitors, whose display, in extent and costliness, exceeded that of Paris in 1867. The gross receipts were about $2,000,000, and expenditures about $9,850,000, making a deficiency of some $7,850,000, which the Government liquidated. The United States was represented by 643 exhibitors, more than half of whom were awarded prizes.

This brings the record up to the Centennial Exposition, at Philadelphia, in 1876, and covers the third quarter of the century. The actual work of making the Centennial Exhibition began on March 3, 1871, when Congress passed an Act creating the United States Centennial Commission. This authorized the President to appoint a commissioner and an alternate from each State and Territory, on the nomination of the respective governors. The appointments were promptly made, and from the whole body of commissioners the following were chosen for the principal executive officers: President, Joseph R. Hawley, of Connecticut; Vice-Presidents, Alfred T. Goshorn, of Ohio, Orestes Cleveland, of New Jersey, John D. Creigh, of California, Robert Lowry, of Iowa, and Robert Mallory, of Kentucky; Director-General, Alfred T. Goshorn; Secretary, John L. Campbell, of Indiana; Assistant Secretary, Dorsey Gardner; Counselor and Solicitor, John L. Shoemaker.

Details of organization and management were vested in an Executive Committee. On June 1, 1872, Congress passed an Act creating the Centennial Board of Finance, with large powers. This Board estimated that the cost of the exhibition would be $10,000,000, and apportioned shares of capital stock for this amount among the several States and Territories, on the basis of population. Subsequently, a Board of Revenue was appointed and vested with authority to collect subscriptions and other funds.

Despite the financial panic of the summer of 1873, preparations progressed so favorably that on July 3 President Grant issued a proclamation reciting that the one-hundredth anniversary of the independence of the United States would be celebrated by holding an international exhibition of arts, manufactures, and the products of the soil and mine, in Philadelphia, in 1876, opening April 19 and closing October 19, and inviting the nations of the world to take part in both the celebration and the exhibition. In response to a formal invitation issued by the Secretary of State, thirty-two foreign governments sent favorable replies for themselves and their colonies.

AGRICULTURAL BUILDING.

(Atlanta Exposition, 1895.)

The city of Philadelphia placed at the disposal of the commissioners a tract in Fairmount Park, aggregating 236 acres, for the principal buildings, and also made proportionately large allotments for the exhibition of livestock and agricultural implements.

Five principal buildings were erected. The Main Exhibition Building was in the form of a parallelogram, 1880 feet long and 464 feet wide, with projections at the centre of the longest sides 416 feet long, and at the centre of the short ones 216 feet long. The building was erected on piers of masonry, wrought-iron columns supporting wrought-iron roof trusses forming the superstructure, the sides of which for some distance above the ground were finished between the columns with paneled brick work. This building covered 21.47 acres, had a floor space of 936,008 square feet, and cost $1,600,000.

The Art Gallery and Memorial Hall, designed to be a permanent structure, was erected on an eminence in the Lansdowne Plateau. It is built of granite, glass, and iron, in the modern Renaissance style of architecture, on a terrace several feet above the level of the Plateau, and cost $1,500,000. The dimensions are: length, 365 feet; width, 210 feet; height, 59 feet. From the centre of the structure rises a dome of iron and glass, 150 feet in height, surmounted by a figure of Columbia with outstretched hands. This building was erected by the State of Pennsylvania, and is now used as a permanent art and industrial museum.

Machinery Hall was 1402 feet long and 360 feet wide, with an annex on the south side 210 by 208 feet, and the main building and annex had together a floor space of 558,440 square feet, or nearly thirteen acres. The total cost was $792,000. Horticultural Hall, near the Art Gallery, was built by the city of Philadelphia for permanent uses. It exhibits the Moorish architecture of the twelfth century, is 383 feet long by 193 feet wide, and is 72 feet high to the top of the lantern. Its cost was $251,937. The Agricultural Building was erected of wood and glass, the ground plan showing a parallelogram 630 feet long by 465 feet wide, and a nave 826 feet long and 100 feet wide crossed by three transepts, and cost about $356,000.

MACHINERY HALL.

(Atlanta Exposition, 1895.)

Other noteworthy edifices were the United States Government Building, 504 feet long by 300 feet wide, prepared to exhibit the various functions of the public service; the Women’s Pavilion, covering an area of an acre, and with its exhibits of woman’s handiwork from the fifteen leading nations of the world constituting the first display of the kind ever attempted on a large scale; twenty-six buildings erected by State and Territorial governments; and many others put up by foreign governments or exhibitors. Before the exhibition closed there were more than two hundred buildings on the ground.

An interesting feature of this exhibition was the observance of State Days, when the governors of the States, with their official staffs and a large following of citizens, made ceremonial visits and held receptions in the several State buildings. There were also numerous other special days, when hosts of people united in a common interest, religious, fraternal, social, military, aquatic, or educational, added thousands to the ordinary attendance.

During the exhibition 9,910,966 persons entered the grounds, of whom 7,250,620 paid the full rate of fifty cents, 753,634 paid twenty-five cents each, and 1,906,692 had free entry. The exhibition represented an outlay of all kinds and by all interests of about $20,000,000. The United States Government aided it with a loan of $1,500,000, which was repaid; the State of Pennsylvania appropriated $1,000,000, and the city of Philadelphia gave $1,500,000. From every point of view it was an unqualified success.

Two years after the Centennial Exposition another one was held in Paris, which not only exceeded all previous ones in that city in size and magnificence, but made an unprecedented display of works of art and literature. On this occasion about one hundred acres were set apart for the various buildings, the exhibitors numbered some eighty thousand, the gross receipts were upward of $2,500,000, and 16,032,725 visitors were registered.

The third world’s exhibition in the United States was held in New Orleans during the winter of 1884–85, and was planned to commemorate the centennial of the first export of cotton from America. The conception was an outgrowth of the exposition in Philadelphia, and was first carried out on a limited scale in Atlanta in 1881, and on a larger one in Louisville in 1883. Under the belief that the cotton centennial should be celebrated in the chief city of the cotton belt, the National Cotton Planters’ Association joined heartily in the scheme suggested by Major E. A. Burke, of New Orleans, for a universal exhibition in that city, in which the great industry of the Southern States should play the most prominent part. Congress aided the movement by an Act incorporating the World’s Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition, and, further, made a loan of $1,000,000 and appropriated $300,000 for a Federal Building. Railroad and other corporations subscribed for $500,000 in stock, the State of Louisiana appropriated $100,000, and the city of New Orleans contributed a similar sum for the erection of a permanent Horticultural Hall.

WOMAN’S BUILDING.

(Nashville Exposition, 1897.)

Formal invitations were sent out to all foreign governments by the State Department at Washington, commissioners were appointed for the several States and Territories, and the time of the exposition was fixed for December 1, 1884, to May 31, 1885. The site selected was the Upper City Park, an unimproved tract of 245 acres, and in its centre was erected the Main Building, a structure built wholly of wood, 1378 feet long and 905 feet wide, and with a continuous roof principally of glass. The entire building covered a space of thirty-three acres. A Music Hall capable of seating 11,000 persons was constructed in the centre of this building, and a Machinery Hall in the rear. An extension at the southern end, 570 by 120 feet, was devoted to mills and factories in operation, and at right angles with this extension was a building given up to sawmills.

The Federal Building, planned for the exhibits of the United States Government and of the States, was 885 feet long by 565 feet wide, and in general style and construction conformed to the Main Building. Horticultural Hall, built of iron and glass, is 600 feet long, 100 feet wide in main structure, and has a central transept carrying out the extreme width to 194 feet. The Art Building, of corrugated iron and glass, stood nearly in front of the Main Building, and was 250 long by 100 feet wide, with a rotunda 50 feet square in the centre. Two other noteworthy buildings were erected by the Mexican Government, one in the style of a native hacienda, with an interior gallery for the display of horticulture and bird-life; the other for native minerals. Excluding those of Mexico, the various buildings covered an area of 2,673,588 square feet, or sixty-two acres, and all buildings covered about seventy-six acres.

Among the special features of this exposition were the display of woman’s work, under charge of Mrs. Julia Ward Howe; of the work of the colored race, under charge of the late Blanche K. Bruce; of the cultivation of cotton and manufacture of the fibre; and of the cultivation, harvesting, and preparation for market of rice and sugar.

On May 5, 1889, another universal exposition was opened in Paris. This was also a commemorative one, marking the centennial of the French Revolution, and because of its political character only the United States and Switzerland accorded it official recognition, although most of the European governments encouraged individual participation. The exposition, despite this feature, was a grand success because of its unusual extent and comprehensiveness and its distinctive features. This exposition cost $8,600,000, and had about 60,000 exhibitors and more than 28,000,000 reported visitors, the greater number, of course, being French.

The making of the World’s Columbian Exposition, to commemorate the discovery of America by Columbus, began soon after the close of the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. It was at first proposed to create a permanent exposition, to be held in Washington in 1892, to illustrate the progress of North, Central, and South America, and a board of promotion was organized. By 1889, however, a strong popular sentiment had been aroused for a more comprehensive display, and citizens of Washington, New York, Chicago, and St. Louis vied with each other in pressing on a special committee of the United States Senate the advantages of their respective cities. A certificate to the effect that subscriptions to the amount of $5,000,000 had been made in Chicago decided the controversy in favor of that city.

On April 25, 1890, Congress passed an Act giving a legal status to a World’s Columbian Exposition, to be held under the auspices and supervision of the United States Government, the organizing corporation to guarantee the subscription of $10,000,000 and the payment of $500,000 before the national commissioners should officially recognize the site offered by the corporation for the exposition. On December 24, following, President Harrison announced the forthcoming exposition, to be opened on May 1, 1893, and invited the nations of the world to participate in it. Congress appropriated in various sums a total of $3,238,250 in money and authorized the coining of 5,000,000 souvenir fifty-cent pieces in silver to be sold for the benefit of the exposition.

The management was vested in a National Commission of two representatives of each State and Territory and of the District of Columbia, and eight from the country at large. The site was Jackson Park, on the shore of Lake Michigan, to which was added the Midway Plaisance tract of 80 acres, making an aggregate ground area of 633 acres. On the main ground more than 150 noteworthy buildings were erected. The Midway Plaisance was devoted to amusements and the illustration of the manners and customs of the world. Here, the most conspicuous of a multitude of great and curious objects was the gigantic revolving and passenger-carrying Ferris Wheel. All of the exposition buildings proper were constructed of wood, iron, and glass, in combination with a material known as “staff,” made by uniting plaster and jute fibre in water, in the form of a paste. As all exterior surfaces were painted white, the exposition grounds became popularly known as the White City.

ART BUILDING. EXACT REPRODUCTION OF THE PARTHENON.

(Nashville Exposition, 1897.)

The principal buildings, with their cost, were those of Manufactures and Liberal Arts, the largest of all, 1687 by 787 feet, $1,500,000; Machinery, $1,285,000; Fine Arts, $670,000; Agriculture, $618,000; Administration, $435,000; Electricity, $401,000; United States Government, $400,000; Live Stock, $385,000; Transportation, $370,000; Horticulture, $300,000; Mines, $265,000; Fisheries, $224,000; Woman’s, $138,000; Forestry, $100,000; and a brick imitation of a modern United States battleship, with complete armament and equipment, $100,000. Foreign governments appropriated a total of $6,571,520 for their respective buildings and exhibits, France leading with $650,000, and being followed by Japan, $630,000; Brazil, $600,000; Germany, $214,200; and Austria, $149,100; and the States and Territories, a total of $6,020,850. The entire cost of construction was $18,322,622.

According to the original Act of Congress, the buildings then completed were dedicated on Columbus Day, October 21, 1892, with prayer, music, and an oration by Chauncey M. Depew, and during that week a number of State buildings were also dedicated. The exposition was formally opened with exceedingly brilliant ceremonies on May 1, 1893, and was closed with an entire lack of formality on October 30, following, in consequence of the assassination of Carter Harrison, mayor of Chicago, two days before. Up to November 12, the receipts from all sources aggregated $33,290,065, and the expenditures, $31,117,353. The total number of paid admissions, excluding those prior to the opening and after the closing, was 21,477,218, and of all, 27,529,400; smallest single-day number, 10,791; largest, on “Chicago Day,” 729,203. In all there were 65,422 exhibitors, and medals were awarded to 23,757 of them, the jury examining and reporting on more than 250,000 separate exhibits.

Present space will only permit the briefest summarizing of this greatest of all international expositions hitherto held,—matchless in extent, in completeness of composition, in grandeur of setting. A pleasing evidence of the influence the undertaking was expected to yield is found in the remarkably large number of international congresses that were held during its progress. This feature alone called for 1245 separate sessions, at which there were 5974 speakers and a special attendance of more than 700,000 persons, chiefly adults. Almost every conceivable branch of human thought and effort had its individual congress. Particularly noticeable among these formal gatherings was the Parliament of Religions, in which Christian, Protestant, Catholic, Jew, and Buddhist expounded their doctrinal beliefs and narrated the story of their sectarian progress and hopes.

The Cotton States’ and International Exposition, opened in Atlanta on September 18, 1895, had its origin in two purposes: the first, to give the industrial conditions of the Southern States a more adequate display than they had at Chicago, owing to the constitutional inability of their Legislatures to appropriate public money for such a purpose; the second, to promote larger trade relations between the South and the Latin-American republics and with Europe. It was set on foot by private enterprise, and received its largest official aid from the city council of Atlanta, which appropriated $75,000.

Piedmont Park, a tract of 189 acres, two miles from the centre of the city, and memorable because traversed by the rifle-pits over which General Sherman threw shells into the city thirty-one years before, was selected as the site. In a natural dip of the ground an artificial lake was constructed, covering thirteen acres, and around it the principal buildings were erected. Not only the Southern, but many of the Northern and Western States aided the enterprise with special buildings and exhibits.

Of the thirteen large buildings, that of the United States Government occupied the most conspicuous site. The Administration Building was a reproduction of portions of Blarney Castle, the Tower of London, Warwick Castle, the Rheinstein in Germany, and St. Michael’s, on the coast of Brittany. On a considerable elevation was the Auditorium, a four-story building with a dome surmounted by a statue of Music. The largest building was that devoted to Manufactures and Liberal Arts, and the most original of all in design was the one set apart for Minerals and Forestry, which was constructed entirely of wood from the different Southern States in its natural condition, with the bark on. The Fine Arts and the Woman’s Buildings were the showiest, and the Negro Building was made attractive by specimens of the industry of negroes in fourteen States. The exposition was closed December 31, and cost about $2,000,000.

The international exposition at Nashville, open from May 1 to October 30, 1897, was a commemoration of the one-hundredth anniversary of the admission of Tennessee into the Union, and had for its special attraction a reproduction of a number of notable buildings of antiquity. The original plan provided for an exposition in 1896, the true centennial year, but the projectors encountered unusual opposition in their efforts to procure the necessary funds, and it was not till early in 1897 that the incorporators were able to begin the creation of the Centennial City.

GRAND COURT, OMAHA EXHIBITION, 1898.

(Night view.)

West Side Park, a former race-course in the suburbs of Nashville, with many natural attractions in running water and forest growths, was selected as the site, and Centennial City was made for the brief time of the exposition a full-fledged municipality, with a mayor, board of aldermen, and a combined police and fire department. The reproduction of notable buildings showed on a reduced scale the Parthenon, the Pyramid of Cheops, the Alamo of Texas, the Blue Grotto of Capri, a glimpse of the Rialto of Venice, and, in the beautiful main entrance, a type of early Egyptian architecture. A flagstaff 250 feet high, cotton and tobacco fields, Venetian gondolas, Vanity Fair, a typical Chinese farm, an abundance of statues of classical and mythological subjects, waterfall and old-time wheel at work, Lake Katherine, Ellen Island, the umbrella fountain, and a large field for athletic sports, were among the pleasurable features. The State made a strong showing of its industrial development and of its riches yet in reserve.

In all 190 acres of ground were occupied. The total receipts were $1,087,227, and the expenditures balanced to a cent. A unique expense feature was that, excluding the preliminary work, the women raised the money and paid the entire running cost of the Woman’s Department. The turnstiles registered 1,886,714 entrances.

This exposition was succeeded in 1898 by the Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition at Omaha, an undertaking designed to show what had been accomplished by the pioneers and their children in the great Trans-Mississippi Valley, and especially in a State that forty-three years before was an unorganized territory in the vast tract known as the Louisiana Purchase. The site was a plateau just north of the city, and in planning the display every consideration was given to originality. Excepting that the grounds constituted a second White City, from the use of “staff,” as at Chicago, every feature of design and construction possessed striking elements of difference from all similar efforts in the past.

The management was under the presidency of Gurdon W. Wattles, and the exposition was formally opened by President McKinley, who, in the White House at Washington, pressed an electric button that started the great engine. The United States Government erected a building of the classic style, following the Ionic order. It was surmounted by a colossal dome supporting a copy of Bartholdi’s statue of “Liberty Enlightening the World,” and had a floor space for exhibits of about 50,000 square feet. The Government also recognized the importance of the event by issuing a special set of commemorative postage stamps. Fine arts was exhibited in a twin-domed building, a structure in two parts, with an elaborate peristyle between them, and all under one great roof.

What afforded the masses the greatest delight were the ethnological exhibits and the instructive and amusing scenes on the Midway Reserve. These included an Indian village, with representatives from every tribe between Alaska and Florida, a Chinese village, an Arabian encampment, a Moorish town, a Swiss village, a Cairo street, the entertaining Egyptian Pyramid, and the gigantic passenger-carrying Sherman Umbrella—a mechanical marvel operated by electricity, and one hundred feet higher than the Ferris Wheel of Chicago. There was also a picturesque lagoon or canal, half a mile long and 150 feet wide at its narrowest part, terminating in an artificial lake trefoil in shape and 400 feet across.

The exposition was opened on June 1 and was closed on October 31. In that time it was visited by more than 2,600,000 people, the largest single-day attendance being 98,785. The total receipts were not quite $2,000,000, and the expenditures were about $1,500,000.

MAIN BUILDING, NATIONAL EXPORT EXPOSITION, PHILADELPHIA, SEPT. 14 TO NOV. 30, 1899.

This completes the record of the most notable expositions and the incidental history of their development, from the commercial fair of the previous century up to near the close of 1899.

There remains to note a form of permanent exhibition that has been purposely reserved for this point. The Commercial Museum, of which Philadelphia has the two most effective examples in existence, is a purely commercial development, yet an educational text-book of unique and extraordinary compass. Though the Philadelphia Commercial Museum and the similar department of the Philadelphia Bourse were both projected before the foreign trade of the United States had reached the enormous volume that caused wonder and alarm alike all over the world, both have had a powerful, direct, and immediate influence in bringing about a greater appreciation abroad of American products.

The commercial museums stand between the American producer and the foreign factor. They inform the former where special articles are needed and the latter of reputable firms who can supply their needs. By a large corps of traveling agents, an enormous correspondence, and a direct coöperation with the State Department and its representatives, these museums keep in the closest possible touch with the commercial interests of the world. All this is independent of the exhibition feature, a vast department in which the principal economic productions, first of the United States and then correspondingly of the world, are spread before the eye of the visitor. In this connection should also be noted the fact that many of our commercial representatives abroad have established at their headquarters collections of American products that are particularly needed in their respective localities.

In all of the foregoing a single text has been kept in mind: What has been the influence of the fair, the exhibition, the international exposition? Ready answers have been suggested by the several items of cost and attendance. Another answer may be divined in their frequency and universality. And at the close of this survey of more than a hundred years, probably the best answer of all is to be found in the efforts in this line with which one century is closed and another opened.

These include the Greater American Exposition at Omaha, July-November, 1899, a commercial success, and a revelation of trans-Mississippi pioneering enterprise. This was supplemented by the Export Exposition and World’s Commercial Congress, the first of the kind ever held under the joint auspices of the Commercial Museum and the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia, in that city, in September-November, 1899. Then followed the Universal Exposition in Paris, in 1900. It was regarded as especially elaborate and successful. It beautified the Champ de Mars and Place des Invalides with handsome industrial palaces, brought into permanent existence the two Palaces of Fine Arts and the Alexander III. Bridge, lined the banks of the Seine with the “Street of Nations,” and swarmed the Trocadero with the world’s colonization. Over 50,000,000 witnessed its panoramic scenes. Its expense was largely provided for by prior sales of tickets on a bonded plan. The century turned with a prospective of the Pan American Exposition at Buffalo and International at Glasgow in 1901; the Ohio Centennial and International at Toledo in 1902; the International at Liege, Belgium, in 1903; and the Louisiana Purchase Centennial at St. Louis in 1904.

---

THE CENTURY’S PROGRESS IN COINAGE, CURRENCY, AND BANKING
By HON. BRADFORD RHODES,
Editor of “Banker’s Magazine.”