THE EXHIBITION NEWS. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 1873.

Few tastes are implanted in the human mind which may not be directed to the

attainment of some practical good for huraaniLy. . Formerly, and indeed not very many years since, it was the fashion to sneer at collectors of curiosities as mere dilettanti, virtuosi and the like, and even those who not only collected, but arranged and classified systematic examples of any particular science, were scarcely regarded as deserving of higher praise. Yet doubtless out of this taste has grown that great series of universal Exhibitions which may designate the latter half of the nineteenth century as the era of Exhibitions, and so far as we know they are indeed the most noticeable feature of it. Commencing" with the fulfilment of the idea, appropriated and improved upon by Prince Albert in the fairy palace of 1851, continued in Paris, repeated in London, and imitated in Viennn, they promise to Kf.ref.eh out till "the crack of doom/ Already America has made one or two faint attempts to carry out something worthy of the name, and now projects one of gigantic magnitude in one of the coming years of this decade. In point of size it is perhaps likely she will excel all former ones, but she is almost equally certain to vulgarize or Barnumize to a certain extent the idea so poetically carried out in IJyde Park, and so worthily eontinned in the other historic capitals of Europe. We mean of course nothing depreciatory of the Americans by this, beyond, the tendency irresistible with them to

allow the almighty dollar to preside too prominently over every undertaking, and so reduce each to the mere condition of a gigantic Show. But to leave tli'se Aaakicn, an i to speak of our little dwarf, " a poor thing," it may be, " but our own,"— we are happy to bu in a position to state that its prospects continue to bo hopeful. We are offered by Dr. Hfast — and the offor i?, we need not say, gladly accepted — the assistance of a representative of old New Zealand and its inhabitant long before the great pukulia Cook visited its shores, or perhaps even before the canoe Arawa came hither with the progenitor of the Maoris. We speak of the moa. He will arrive, we believe, but in a disjointed condition ; but (here are skilfm physicians hi Hokitika who will speedily " set him on his legs." The Melbourne firms who receive so much of our money, have promised g>'eat things, and, notably, Messrs James M'Ewan and Co. and the Messrs Duckett, the former giving 1 a cup, and the latter something equally valuable. Neither

are the warehousemen who supply the ladies of Hokitika with their various vanities behindhand. Locally, Messrs Chesney, Cassidy, Duncan, Pizzey, Kortegast, and Mrs O'Hara promise medals, while to the Prize Fund and the list of Special Prizes havo sixteen

additions each been made. Dr. Hector, with the interest he exhibits in everything scientific, has promised some very valuable exhibits and altogether we may say the prospects o* the Hokitika Exhibition are rosecolored. The Committee have deter" mined on making the price of the season tickets half-a-£uinea for individuals, and a guinea for families, while the price of admission will be one shilling, with the exception of the first two days when it will be fixed at half-a-crown* We hope to hear ere we go to press that the opening of the Nelson Exhibition has been a great success, and we shar keep our eyes bent on its progress in (he hope that we may gleau something by way of useful instruction and of prompt imitation