Note {193} — THE ROAD TO YORKSHIRE.

Mr. Francis Fuller, whose plan of management on this estate affords a model for both English and Irish landowners, is the gentleman, who, after taking most active and vigorous means, in co-operation with Mr. Scott Russell and Mr. Henry Cole, for bringing before the public Prince Albert’s plan of a Great Exhibition of Industry of All Nations, alone saved the whole scheme from being abandoned before it was made public, by finding contractors in Messrs. Mundays to advance the £100,000, and who did actually advance £21,000, without which the President of the Board of Trade refused to issue the Royal Commission, on which the whole success of the scheme rested. Until the scheme was safely launched, Mr. Fuller, as a Member of the Executive Committee, devoted his time, and freely expended his money, for the purpose of supporting this great undertaking. When it was fairly launched the care of his important business, of which Middleton forms a very small part, occupied the greater part of his time, and hence his name has appeared less in conjunction with that splendid triumph of Industry than those of other gentlemen.