The Colossal Fete at the Crystal Palace

About This Item

Title: The Colossal Fete at the Crystal Palace
Date: 3 April 1858
Creator(s): Walt Whitman
Whitman Archive ID: per.00943
Source: Brooklyn Daily Times, 3 April 1858: 2. Our transcription is based on a digital image of a microfilm scan of the original issue. Microfilm of original issue held at Pennsylvania State University Libraries. For a description of the editorial rationale behind our treatment of the journalism, see our statement of editorial policy.
Editorial note: This piece is unsigned, as was the case for most of Whitman's journalism. However, this editorial is part of a series of texts that deal with a coherent theme that has been identified by the Whitman Archive journalism team as likely authored by Whitman. This decision is based on a combination of historical and (auto)biographical accounts, similarity to contemporary Whitman writings, a history of scholarly attribution, extant clippings retained by Whitman, computational stylometric analysis, and, in some cases, manuscript evidence in Whitman’s hand.
Contributors to digital file: Kaylen Michaelis Brnadi Faulkner Stefan Schöberlein Karie Cobb
Cite this page: Whitman, Walt. "The Colossal Fete at the Crystal Palace." The Walt Whitman Archive. Gen. ed. Matt Cohen, Ed Folsom, & Kenneth M. Price. Accessed 16 July 2024. <http://www.whitmanarchive.org>.
Source File: per.00943.xml (TEI)

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THE COLOSSAL FETE AT THE CRYSTAL PALACE.—

The preparations for the great fete to be given at the Crystal Palace on the 8th inst., for the benefit of the Hunter Woodis Benevolent Association, are now nearly completed, and judging from the outline of them, which we have seen, it will be the occasion for a display of splendor and magnificence never before witnessed in this country.

The military of New York, and this and the neighboring cities, are likely to attend almost en masse. Large bodies of Firemen, the Knight’s Templar, and numerous other associations are also to participate, while a host of celebrities in the way of Governors of States, members of Congress, Mayors of cities, officers of the Army and Navy, and including our Moslem visitors, Mohammed Pasha and suite, have accepted invitations to attend.

The first floor of the vast building has been cleared and prepared for dancing, and every available flag, banner, standard and kindred adornment in the city has been levied on for the purposes of decoration. What with the bright dashing uniforms of the military, the brilliant and showy costumes of the Templars, firemen and other associations, the gay dresses of the ladies, as they throng the great hall, gorgeous with its array of banners, and flags, illumined by five thousand jets of gas, and a Bude light in the dome, yielding more light than all the others combined, we cannot imagine a more magnificent coup d’oeil¹ than the Palace will present on the night in question. It will fairly rival some of the most gorgeous of the fairy scenes in the Arabian Nights².

Ald. Buel, of 61 South Seventh street, is the agent for the sale of the tickets in this section of the city. By purchasing their tickets of Paymaster B., each purchaser will be entitled to ten tickets for bread for distribution to the poor of this city, while if purchased in New York, the agreement is that they shall be distributed there. See advertisement in another column.

Notes:

1. Coup d'oeil in French means "to take a comprehensive glance." The term appears in Whitman's late 1850s notes on the French language (see Stefan Schöberlein, "Rambles Among Words: Whitman in the Etymological Thicket," The Oxford Handbook of Walt Whitman, eds. Kenneth M. Price and Stefan Schöberlein [New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2024], 157–75, esp. 168) [back]

2. Arabian Nights, also known as Thousand and One Nights is a collection of Middle Eastern and Indian stories with an unknown date or author. [back]