In 1837 the South London Horticultural Society, formed in the preceding year, held the first of many successful flower-shows in the gardens. In the same year the first panorama was displayed—‘Vesuvius, with the town and port of Posilippo.’ The lake was, of course, the Bay of Naples, with feluccas and a miniature British frigate lying at anchor. The painter of Vesuvius, as of many of the later panoramas, was George Danson, the scene-painter at Astley’s. Danson was a clever artist in his way; his panoramic drawing was good, and his colouring well kept under, so that his productions would bear inspection by daylight. At night-time the fireworker of the gardens, J. Southby, appeared on the scene, and Vesuvius was soon in eruption. On the day when the first eruption was to take place the manager of the gardens—if _Bell’s Life_ is not misleading us—solemnly warned the chief fireman of the City, in case he should send to Walworth engines that might be more needed elsewhere. Vesuvius was repeated in 1838, and henceforth the Surrey Zoo was never without an exhibition of the kind. It is a good rule always to see a panorama or a big model whenever one has the opportunity, but the reader will perhaps be contented if I set forth the chronology of the Surrey panoramas in a footnote. {86a} However carefully painted the canvas might be, a subject was preferred that lent itself to treatment by gunpowder and fireworks. Thus, Vesuvius was followed by Mount Hecla; Old London was burnt in the Great Fire of 1666; Gibraltar was besieged; Badajoz stormed ‘with effects of real ordnance’; and the taking of Sebastopol was truly terrific. The city of Rome (covering five acres) was a favourite subject. The scene showed the bridge over the Tiber, St. Peter’s, and the Castle of St. Angelo. At night-time Southby’s fireworks legitimately reproduced the Roman Girandola of Easter Monday: “At the Surrey Menagerie every one knows (Because ’tis a place to which every one goes) There’s a model of Rome: and as round it one struts One sinks the remembrance of Newington Butts; And having one’s shilling laid down at the portal, One fancies oneself in the City Immortal.” {86b} Quieter efforts were the Temples of Elora, and Edinburgh, a subject suggested by Prince Albert. [Picture: Stirring up the Great Fire of London (Surrey Zoo). After George Cruikshank, 1844]