The Sun.
London, England, 1863-06-12 00:00:00

TIMES.—The proposed purchase of the site and
buildings of last year's Exhibition on behalf of the
Government has already creased.so muchattention,
and been made the subject of. such violent and per-
verse misrepresentation, that we think a consider-
able service may be rendered to. the cause of truth
and justice by a fair and dispessionate statement of
the numerous transactions and the discordant views
and motives which have brought things to the pecu-
liar position in which they now stand. The surplus
attained by the Exhibition of 1851, amounting to
4bout 1150,000, was invested by that CornmisSion
in the purchase of the Kensington Gore estate, to be
held and disposed of by them for the purposes of
art and science. Upon a portion of that estate was
placed the iron shed which was originally built as a
receptacle for the undisposed of objects of the first
Exhibition. On one side of this unsightly, but .
cheap and convenient structure, have risen, on the
same estate, the buildings in which are contained
the Pictures, Museum, and Schools of the Depart-
ment of Science and Art. To the north-west of
these have been erected, on the same estate, the ar-
cades and conservatory of the Horticultural Gar-
dens; and south of those gardens lies the land on
which was erected the Exhibition Building of last
year, with the exception of the two annexes. In
the spring of last year it was thought proper that a
building should be provided for the reception of
the Natural History collections of the British Mu-
seum. We have often explained in these columns
the necessity of such a step, and, shown how grie-
vously the main objects of the Museum are defeated
by the manner in which its specimens are crowded
together or piled up in vaults, unseen, unknown,
and unregarded. Whatever may be the result of
the discussion of next Monday, we are convinced
that nothing could give so great an impulse to the
study of natural history as the exhibition in a suit-
able building, with proper amplitude, of the animal
and mineral kingdoms. The first struggle was to
retain these, collections at Bloomsbury, but that
appears now to he given up, and the question has
narrowed itself to a choice of the place to which
these collections are to be removed. Not only
had the Commissioners of 1851 lent 161 acres of
their lend for the purposes of the Exhibition
of 1852 ; they were also bound to the pro-
moters of that Exhibition to leave the land free
for the purpose of all future Exhibitions. It
was therefore not competent for them last year to
offer any portion of the 162 acres to the Govern-
ment for the reception of the Natural History col-
lections of the British Museum. Last year's pro-
posal was that Government should buy the five

acres comprised in the western annexe, and upon
them should erect a building for the reception of
the Natural History collections, the whole estimated
to cost about £700,000. The House of Commons
rejected this proposal, partly on the ground of the
uncertainty of expense, and partly, it may be
presumed, because even the large sum so demanded
would not supply the wants of the Government.
Since then those wants have been more carefully
examined. We require at once a large acreage for
the Natural History collections and for many other
purposes. The Patent Museum, which has a fund
of £13,5,000 for the purposes of building, is incon-
veniently crowded into a portion of the iron shed
irreverently styled the " Brompton Boilers." The
most interesting relics, which future generations
will wake pilgrimages to see, are huddled together
in a most discreditable manner. The first steam-
engine and the first locomotive are treated with as
little respect as if they really were what they
appear—nothing but ricketty frames of rusty iron.
The Geological Museum has outgrown its elegant
residence in Jermyn-street, and must either be ex-
tended by buying er leasing, at the public expense,
some of the most valuable houses in London, with
one front in Jermyn-street and the other in Picca-
dilly, or find a resting place elsewhere. The
National Portrait Gallery, the Vernon pictures in
the South Kensington Museum, and the magnifi-
cent collection of prints hid away in the British
Museum, all need exhibition. These, omitting many
minor partiCulars, are our immediate and pressing
wants. The question is, bow shall we supply them P
The Commissioners of 1851 have undertaken to
answer this question. As last year's Exhibition
left no surplus, the Commissioners of 1851 re-
ceived back the land which they had lent dis-
charged of the covenant to preserve it for
the purposes of future Exhibitions, and covered
with the building, which the contractors who
had erected it were bound, Upon receiving
notice, to take away. The land of the Commis-
sioners on which the Exhibition building stands
is estimated to be worth at least £15,000 per
acre. This land they offer to the Government for
£6,000 per acre. That is, they offer for £lOO,OOO
that which is now worth £250,000, annexing to
their offer only the condition that the land should
be applied for purposes contemplatedin their charter
—that is, for purpose of science and art. The .16i
acres may be obtained by the public for the same
sum as two acres contiguous to the British Museum.
The motives by which the Commissioners are actu-
ated are plain enough. They have the alternative
of disposing of their estate to the Government for
the purposes of science or art or of realising the
property, and thus possessing themselves of half a
million of money, in the disposal of which they
would doubtless find more difficulty than a Chan-
cellor of the Exchequer does in the disposal of his
surplus. On the other hand, the object of their
charter is accomplished if they can dispose of their
land so as to promote the interest of art and science,
however much below its value that land may be
sold. They naturally think that nothing can be
done more suitable to the purpose of their incorpora-
tion than to gather in one spot as many collections
as possible illustrating the works of nature and of
man, to rescue from oblivion and decay so many
valuable and beautiful objects, and to meet for a
time at least the perpetual demand for further space.
The Exhibition Building is the property of the con-
tractors who built it, but for the purposes of valua-
ble ownership it can only be considered as a mass
of brick, wood, iron, and glass. They must remove
it if required, and, as it must be taken to pieces in
order to be removed, the workmanship goes for
nothing as an element of value. The contractors
are to receive £BO,OOO, and this sum represents, we
believe, very accurately the value of the materials
over and above the expense of pulling them down
and taking them away. The cause of the cheapness
of this offer is not, as has been said, the worthless-
ness of the buildings, but the fact that they exist
only on sufferance. There are, besides, refresh-
ment-rooms, erected by. the Commissioners on the
north side of the Exhibition, which are to be- gbld
for £20,000. Thus, by a curious conjuncture of
circumstances, the public are offered for £200,000
land which could be sold immediately for £250,000,
and buildings the actual cost of the erection of
which only last year was £250,000 more. But it
would be ridiculous to assert that the Exhibition
Buildings-would in their present condition be fit
for the purposes which we have mentioned. The
flooring, as everybody knows, is temporary, and the
glass roof must be replaced by something more sub-
stantial. The glass domes also, generally and justly
condemned by public taste, can hardly be allowed
to remain as they are at present. The brickwork is,
we believe, thoroughly solid and substantial. After
:he flooring and roof have been renewed it will be
necessary to divide the building by interior walls,
so as to separate one department from another.
When this has" been done something will be de-
manded to relieve the extreme plainness of a build-,
ing neither ill-planned nor ill-proportioned within,
but totally void of the least semblance of ornament.
For these purposes £284,000 will be required. So
that we have the offer, if we please, of entering into
possession—and that in a very short time—of 16/
acres, covered with buildings adapted to our wants;
for a sum under half a million, or £200,000 less
than we were asked to pay last year for five conti-
guous acres and the buildings upon them. This is
the question which the House of Commons will have
to decide on Monday. We have taken some trouble
to ascertain the facto of this rather complicated case,
and we believe they may be thoroughly relied on.
We cannot doubt that the proposal is eminently
economical. If it is rejected, it must be on the ground
of taste—a subject to which argument is prover-
bially. inapplicable. We only hope that it will not
bleectrieojnescttehduusnder the idea that the expenditure can
be saved, and that no alternative proposition need
be contemplated. If we do not provide for our col-
lections
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