FEENCH WOBKHEN ON THE LONDON EXHIBITION, ETC. 541 
workmen for some time, that they had the best of opportunities of judging, 
and that they are convinced that the necessities of life are quite as cheap 
in London as in Paris. 
2. Report of Lithographers . — The delegates in this trade complain that 
many of the works in the Exhibition were hung so high that it was quite 
impossible for any one to judge accurately of their execution. Some 
reproductions of works of art, in colours, from Munich, are spoken of in 
laudatory terms, as regards workmanship and cheapness, although the 
artistic ability is considered to be mediocre. As to the English litho- 
graphic copies of water-colour drawings, the report says : — “ They exhibit 
a truthfulness and richness of execution of which we had no conception,” 
and that “the great success they have achieved with the public is per- 
fectly intelligible.” The delegates were, however, astonished at the great 
number of stones used in the production of some of the more elaborate 
works, and declare that in France the co-operation of the artist and the 
ability of the printer would enable the French lithographers to dispense, 
in many cases, with one-third of the number. The English mode of 
drawing on the stone is described as peculiar, and as leaving nothing to be 
desired on the score of fineness and solidity. Another grand point of supe- 
riority in England is declared to be the paper, in which respect the French 
lithographers are said to be worse off than those of any other country in 
the world. 
The English paper, says the report, is as supple and as well adapted to 
take up the colours, without injury to the stone, as ours is hard and un- 
fitted for its work. In another place the paper in use in France is declared 
to possess no one good quality 'whatever but its whiteness. 
In lithographs executed with crayons and tints on three or four stones, 
the French workmen claim superiority over both the English and Ger- 
mans ; and, as regards works in black and white, the reporters say that 
England has not yet, apparently, found lithographic artists of sufficient 
talent to stand against copper-plate engraving, which she holds in such 
high estimation ; while the writing of English lithographers is spoken of 
with the highest admiration, the reporters declaring that the beauty of 
some of the specimens which they saw almost surpassed belief. 
Like the tanners, the lithographers visited some of the London establish- 
ments, hut, unlike the former, they speak in the highest terms of the 
courtesy with which they were received, and of the openness with which 
all the modes of operation were exhibited to them. “ On the part of the 
workmen,” says the report, “ there was none of that obsequious curiosity 
which assails visitors in our ateliers ; the well-behaved apprentices had 
none of the bantering effrontery of our own, but everywhere we were re- 
ceived with a gravity as cordial as temperament and the difference of 
language admitted.” 
The systems pursued by the publishers of England and France are 
contrasted entirely in favour of the former, that of the latter being de- 
nounced as narrow and parsimonious in the extreme, and as tending only 
to the production of cheap and bad work. 
As to the condition of the working lithographer, the report says : — 
“We found, as we indeed already knew, that for piece-work the English 
