338 
STATE AGEICULTUKAL SOCIETY. 
crowned here and there with grim old castles, now dismantled, with deep, 
narrow valleys dotted with stirring villages and cities, with extensive barren 
heaths and immense forests of gnarled and perverse-looking timber,—^just 
such a country as the rude, barbarian Briton might have been expected tc 
covet and defend. And here, almost shut in by the sea, living ^heir own life 
and developing in their own way, their rude descendants have fought and 
lived through all the past sixteen hundred years. On the 30th of March, just 
before dawn—in time to catch a glimpse of the river Seine, with its 
ten thousand glittering lights on bridges and quays, revealing, in dim outline, 
the miles of stately palaces that line that noble river on either side—I awoke 
in Paris. It was Sunday morning, and the great Exposition was to open on 
Monday. Just in time. 
Of the Palace of Exposition, the opening and the Exposition itself, I shall 
say but little in this place, as I am to make an official'report thereon to the 
Governor—barely this: that the buildjng was admirably adapted to its use; 
that the formal opening, on the 1st of April, by the Emperor and Empress, 
was without the anticipated pomp of state ceremonial, owing to the fact that 
exhibitors and commissioners were generally some weeks behind with their 
work; and that, finally, when complete, the Exposition of 1867 far exceeded . 
all its predecessors in systematic order of arrangement, in the number of 
exhibits, in general brilliancy and magnificence, and in the almost universal 
attendance of the royal representatives of foreign powers. 
Having spent a full month in looking up, unpacking and arranging our 
Wisconsin products, in aiding the U. S. Commissioner General to bring order 
out of chaos in the American Department, and in making visits to the lead¬ 
ing educational institutions of Paris and vicinity, I set out upon my long- 
contemplated tour of the Continent. 
As the season was unusually backward, it seemed better to travel in South¬ 
ern Europe first, and to leave the middle and northern countries to the sum¬ 
mer months. In pursuance of this plan, and with the view of economizing 
travel and time as much as possible, I first entered the Grand Duchy of Baden 
—not, this time, for the purpose of inspecting its industry, among the most 
backward of the most backward German States, but rather, and almost solely, 
to visit the noted polytechnic school at Carlsruhe, one of the best in Europe. 
Thence I made my way into the prosperous little Kingdom of Wurtem- 
burg, stopping first at Stuttgart, the capital, to examine the royal poly¬ 
technic school and school of art and many other institutions and objects of 
interest; then going by rail to Kircheim, in company with a Wisconsin friend 
residing there ; thence on foot to Hohenheim, the location of the first and 
also the most distinguished agricultural school in the world ;j thence by 
stage across the rich and beautifully undulating country to -, in the 
valley of the Neckar, shut in by magnificent vine-clad and castle-crowned 
hills, to Tubingen, seat of the renowned University of Wurtemburg (where 
I was^most^cordially received and kindly entertained by Dr. Schaffle, the 
able jurist, professor and author) ; thence back again by rail to Plockingen 
and from thence to Ulm, on the banks of the Danube. 
