The William F. Cody Archive: Documenting the life and times of Buffalo Bill

THE INTERNATIONAL HORTICULTURAL EXHIBITION.

LONDON is like a spoilt child that gets everything it cries for. This time, if it has not secured the moon, it has obtained something infinitely better in the earthly paradise now planted and already in full bloom at Earl's Court. Here the jaded citizen, surrounded for the time being with delicious cool green foliage and blossoming flowers and plants, can forget the glare and dust inseparable from the early summer season in the streets of this gigantic Metropolis. The attractions of a fashionable London Season are not for all of us, and what an incalculable boon will not these gardens present to the ordinary overstrained and wearied London workers, who could not, if they would, taste the country delights of Nature in all their opening loveliness of bud and leaf. But now, when Nature's charms have been brought to their very doors, many an hour will be snatched from desk and counter to be well spent at Earl's Court. If the horticultural side of the Exhibition appeals mainly to the masses, Buffalo Bill's Wild West (which we warmly welcome back again) appeals to all alike, both to the masses and the classes. To the effete and blasé inhabitants of the most civilised city in the world it presents the most exhilarating and novel enchantments, as in all the intensely realistic scenes from prairie or backwoods one is brought face to face, as it were, with reality. This is especially noticeable in the hand-to-hand encounters between the early American settlers and bands of prowling hostile Indians, or as one watches, with fascinated gaze, the perilous journey made by the Deadwood Coach and its doomed passengers. The old coach itself looks as if it, too, had gone over to the majority in one of these deadly raids, and that it is only its ghost that now wildly circles the arena at Earl's Court. In the big ring the sporting proclivities of the many have been well catered for, beginning with the incomparable shooting feats of little Annie Oakley, Johnny Baker, and Colonel W. F Cody, and numerous races, including a very picturesque one between American backwoods women. The mounting and retaining the seat on the buck-jumping horses are robbed of much of the sense of danger by the agility and expertness displayed by the cowboys and the small and light-looking mustangs, who seem almost like playthings in the hands of their riders. The North American Indians are naturally a most interesting feature, and nothing could possibly be more picturesque than the scenes of foray in which they dash hither and thither on their half-wild horses, their lithe bodies painted in all the colours of the rainbow, or their stealthy, half-creeping dances to the monotonous banging of primitive drums. The oftener we see this superb show, the more its realism grows upon us, and this is the highest compliment we can pay to its inceptor, Mr. Nate Salisbury, and its practical organiser, Colonel W. F. Cody.

At the conclusion of the afternoon show of the "Wild West," the visitors return to the great hall, where expressions of admiration are heard on all sides at the beauty of the indoor gardens, and the lavish decoration of the walls with exquisitely-painted landscapes, and the roof hung with long garlands of flowers and foliage. Here, to quote a line from the "Wild West" programme, "rain or shine," the visitor can find plenty of entertainment in listening to the excellent musical programme of the Military Exhibition bands, whilst admiring the indoor gardens full of beautiful flowering plants, some even hailing all the way from Holland. But our own well-known growers hold their own, especially Messrs. Laing and Turner; Messrs. Ramsey, with a lovely show of roses; Messrs. Williams's interesting collection of insectivorous plants; Messrs. Cutbush, and many others. As the afternoon deepens into evening, with the first shadows of twilight come twinkling out, on every point of vantage lent by tree or roof, innumerable little fairy lights, many being suspended in long lines overhead from invisible supports. To our artist we have left the task of delineating the beauties of some of the gardens of the past. Of these he shows on page 647 "The Temple of the Pharaohs" and the Tudor Garden. The latter is partly hidden by the quadrangle of a mansion of the period, and so quaint and old-world does it all look, that one would not be surprised to see behind its diamond-paned windows, or treading between its formal flowerbeds, some well-known figure in the history of the past.