REPORT OF MR. W. J. STILLMAN.
355
PHOTOGRAPH! AT THE EXHIBITION OF VIENNA.
BY W. J. STILLMAN.
Group XII.
Amongst the industrial products collected at Vienna, and which, owing to a bad arrangement of the contributions, were deprived of an adequate presentation, perhaps the least cared for, considering the prominence which it has attained of late ■ in many scientific and industrial undertakings, was photography. Its position, half-way between art and manufacture, is one which explains, perhaps, this want of attention; for art had its separate quarters, and photography, too much dependent on the capacities of individuals and unadapted to the arrangements of the great industries, had no collective interest to be looked after or national advantage to be subserved by bringing it prominently before the public. Yet it is safe to say, that if due regard had been given to the immense range of subjects of absorbing attraction and scientific value, over which it has extended itself since the last great international industrial gathering, and the proper steps had been taken to bring together .a complete collection of its products, the world would have been astonished at the results which have grown out of what, within the memory of the present generation, was only a curious phenomenon of the action of light upon certain chemical products, of scarcely more prom- J se of commercial value than the spectrum analysis has to-day. It not only has become the constant and indispensable solace °f domestic affections,—almost as wide-spread and cheap as light itself,—and brought reminders and lessons of art to the homes of the millions, but it has become the infallible record °f almost all physical phenomena, the touchstone of astronom-