The Sun.
London, England, 1863-07-03 00:00:00

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word. We grieve to say we anticipate no such result.
The buildings which formed the subject of last
night's discussion will be carted away ; and there
will remain as we understand the buildings included
in the purchase of the site—that is, the garden
front, excepting the centre, which belongs to the
Horticultural Society. Denuded of the nave and
the northern courts, these refreshment rooms will
present anything but a graceful exterior to the
Cromwell-road. That exterior is all that the occu-
pants of the houses in Cromwell-road will see from
their drawing-rooms for many a long year to come.
Before long a lofty hoarding, with "Posters be-
ware !" at regular intervals, will surround the
doomed site. Inside will be moun is, holes, brick-
bats, weeds, unburied animals, and castaway hu-
man raiment. Could that power which opened the
eyes of eEneas to the airy warfare over, Troy do the
like for us, we should see all the schools and all the
styles, institutes, archmologists, engineers, fighting
for the ground. The Society of Arts, the
South
Kensington Museum, would be seen in mortal con-
flict with the outside world of Art and Science and
the public instincts of utility and economy.. De-
bate after debate, commission after commission,
will stir the endless question, till the topic becomes
as familiar as the noise of street traffic and the cry
of the costermonger. Ten years hence, when many
of us have passed from the scene, and the rest of us
are not quite so keen after historical portraits, ma-
jolica ware, and patent steam engines as perhaps
we have been, the site will remain a howling wil-
derness. It will be as the site for the Fleet
Prison has remained for a quarter of a cen-
tury, as the waste ground on the south side of
Downing-street has remained for half a century,
and as many other sites have remained for longer
or shorter periods. Could we hope that something
will at last be done, we cannot venture to hope that
it will give us what we want, or satisfy the taste
of the day, or even give us peace. In virtue of our
own position, we cannot throw ourselves into this
or that school with the enthusiasm which is not
only allowable but even very graceful in some other
quarters. Though disposed to prefer stone, and not
insensible to the charms of red brick, we cannot for-
get that no nation of antiquity scrupled to use stucco,
and that even the temples of Paestum were stuccoed
and coloured. Though we like to see a building
stand well, with a good open area before it, yet we
can only regard that as a rare fortune, not as an
absolute necessity. Though we should like to see
these 17 acres raised almost any number of feet
above the level of Brompton, yet we remember how
many great edifices we have walked down into, and
that the requisite elevations here insisted on would
cost several hundred thousand pounds. Though
we must confess to the usual craving for eternal
structures, yet we have seen many works of the
giants pulled down, and others come to grief.
Hungerford-market was a most classic and most
costly structure, but it has just been carted away.
The Pantheon at Paris exhausted one quarry for its
foundation, and another for its superstructure; but
the latter has crushed the former, and half the
windows have had to be filled with masonry. The
south front of the British Museum is an eternal
structure and an eternal nuisance. Waterloo-bridge
is an eternal structure and has ruined the proprie-
tors. We are glad to find our opinion as to the
capable character of the exterior corroborated by
some eminent architects. The building is unfinished,
and there is an old and true saying about the class of
people who ought not to be allowed to see an un-
finished work. Every large building is sure to
present difficulties, for the plain reason that all our
theories of ornamentation are derived from a smaller
scale. If we will have a Flavian amphitheatre, or
an aqueduct forty miles long, or a Basilica to hold
ten thousand people, or any other huge thing, we
must have immense repetitions and accumulations,
orders piled one upon another, and " the Pantheon
mounted on the Temple of Peace." Wherever there
is exaggeration. as there must be in many cases, the
effort is sure to exceed the limits of taste and sense.
The national Museum of France is Versailles, where
the greatest mass of architecture and the most am-
bitious flights of genius have produced the smallest
possible result. But we are told we may spare our
say and husband our regrets, for that the truth is the
House of Commons has set its face against the
whole thing." It will stop the movement of art,
which, with some pardonable indiscretions and
some less pardonable foibles, has done so much for
us lately. Teat we hardly believe. We have not
yet come to such a pass that the richest aristocracy
in the world, which pays the highest prices for pic-
tures, makes the most costly collections, and in-
dulges in the most magnificent houses and furni-
ture, should begin to grudge the public its compa-
ratively cheap enjoyment of collections belonging
to all. That we do not believe. But it is a con-
clusion that the public will be driven to if they see
the Legislature more eager to shut up and pull
down than to open and raise. There is much to be
said for last night's decision, but not if it rests there.
POST —The House of Commons has refused, by
an overwhelming majority, to sanction the purchase
of the International Exhibition Building at South
Kensington. On the division, the numbers were
one hundred and twenty-one in favour of the Go-
vernment proposal, and two hundred and eighty-
seven against it. In the propriety of this decision
a still greater majority of the public will coincide.
Indeed, we doubt if ever a scheme was suggested
which was received with more universal disfavour
than that which last night was so decisively re-
jected by the Lower House of Parliament. A few
public organs supported it, and, as will be seen,
upwards of one hundred members of the Legisla-
ture sanctioned it with their formal approval ; but
we venture to say that very few of our readers can
call to mind one of their acquaintance who ex-
pressed himself in favour of the adaptation of the
temporary shed at Brompton to the purposes of a
museum which was to satisfy the wants of future
generations. Literally speaking, almost every one
who took the trouble of considering its merits was
opposed to the project. Nor is it surprising. The
International Exhibition Building was raised under
a contract by which the builders were bound to
remove it at the end of a year. As prudent men,
they very properly avoided all useless expenditure
in endeavouring to invest with solidity or
strength a building which it was intended should
bear the wear and tear of a few months. It was
not drained, because, for the purposes of an Ex-
hibition, drainage was unnecessary. The walls,
wherever bricks and mortar were employed,
made of just sufficient strength to support a certair.
number of iron girders and a glass roof wit The
were
cruu.bling to pieces before the end of a year. te'm_
flooring was—well, even for the purposes as
porary exhibition—shockingly bad, and thoef moof,
trructed
our readers can doubtless recollect, wasefieesadmis-
on some recondite principle which gave --e however
sion to every falling shower. Irrespeetiv.
of its faults of construction, the Internin thisn city
toyf
.sutinOnsiaglhEtlxhi!
bition Building was certainly the r
the many unsightly edifices to bemeeoesn
and its environs. And yet with all these tailings,
besides, as a first
the Public were
both physical and aesthetic, asked
putting it in a
to purchase it at a high price, Pay,
a quarter of a
instalment of the outlay necessary
efofr
uPvraosal hash a beens
the
exrejected,stieg
tolerable state of repair,
million of money. This proposal
only
to
as it deserved to be; and no
its generation reason to be thankful
Fowke's
representa-
tives for refusing to perpetuate Captain
at house-building,
maiden effort
bless the lucky but posterity may
in time to comechance which has
saved it from the annoyance and the cost of keeping
in a state of repair a tunable-down shed plastered
over with stucco. We have endeavoured on pre-
vious occasions
i ton
place before the public the real
issue involved the adaptation of the International
Exhibition Building to the purposes of a national
museum. Of the necessity of possessing some
building Within which not merely to collect but to
arrange the
which the varied treasures of science and art
nation is from year to year accumulating,
almost every one is satisfied, and the large majority
which a fortnight since in the House of Commons de-
cided on purchasing seventeen acres of land as a site
for such a building fairly represented the opinion of
the people upon this point. The museum in Blooms-
bury is confessedly too small for the purposes to
which it is at present applied. A very consider-
able portion of its contents might, so far as the
public are coneernsd, just as well be at the Anti-
pcdes. The only question that ever was raised on
the subject of a change in the existing order of
things regarded the site of the building, which was
universally admitted to be absolutely indispensable.
Some suggested the enlargement of the existing
structure in Great Russell-street ; others advocated
the erection of an independent building; some pro
posed a central situation, whilst others, on econo-
mical grounds, expressed themselves contented with
a suburban site. All disputes on these matters
were however determined by the vote of the House
of Commons appropriating the sum of £120,000 for
the purchase of the grounds on which at present
stands the Exhibition Building of last year. Last
evening the issue was confined to the simple ques-
tion whether the country would avail itself of_ the
building at present covering the ground whielhthier
has purchased, or whether it would compterae
owners to remove it, and then set about conts• •
och
ing an entirely new building according

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designs as it should deem best suited to
purposes for which a national museum is
After a lengthened debate the former alter
unconditionally rejected. The chief g
which the Chancellor of the Exchequk
moving the resolution for the purchase and
tion of the Exhibition Building of last year,
the Government proposal were these : to purchase
the present structure would be cheaper than to
build an entirely new one; and to secure possession.
of an existing building would enable the nation_
forthwith to dispose of end arrangecollections which
otherwise must remain for a much longer time hidden
from the public view. The opposition to the pu.ca t_.c
of the building rested upon equally broad grouene.
The economy of buying it was denied, because lrO
the nature of its construction the expenditure do.-
mended for keeping it in repair would be infinitely'
greater than that necessitated by a different descrip-
tion of building; and although it was admitted that
the erection of an entirely new structure would in-
volve .12 greater delay, still it was alleged that the
present one was entirely unad elated for the purpoes
which it was sought to be applied. The main on-
jection, however, to the Government proposal W3s
based upon the irredeemable and irremovable ugli-
ness of the late Exhibition Buileing. On this point
indeed there could be little dicipute ; but in a metro-
polis abounding with public buildii gs the immense
majority of which possess no claim to architectural
beauty, her Majesty's Government doubtless con-
sidered it was a hypercritical objection to cavil at
one more being added to the number which might
fail to Secure the approval of architectural connois-
seurs. The objections of the opponents of the scheme
were in fact unanswerable. It was perfectly useless
for the Chancellor of the Exchequer to exhibit co-
loured designs to the house, and endeavour to satisfy
it that, if the opportunity was afforded, a very re-
spectable-looking building would be secured by the
country as a national museum. In the course of his
speech Mr. Gladstone was obliged to refer to the
domes, and in doing so avoided a disquisition upon
their merits, whether useful or ornamental, by say-
ing that it was the intention of the Government to
what should bn done
oThe House of Commonsf
with postpone
them t
tcoo n
thes id
future.erat i
evidently thought that what might be said of the
domes might equally be said of the building
they surmounted. 'No part of the scheme was it
which
prepared to adopt, and no portion of the building
was it ready to purchase andforredtehceormataes.s
of
airrloina:
meat will not give £BO,OOO
glass, and bricks which constitute theseltatteo
work
kibuis-
tion Building, so the contractors
.
soon as thelease to reduce tor may,ftosrctohmempotnheannt
parts, and find some other purchase
the British public.

Naval and Military Intelligence.

THE NAVY.
Capt. R. S. Hewlett, C. 8., Superintendent of the
Royal Naval College, Portsmouth, and command-
ing her Majesty's ship Excellent, yesterday, for
the last time during his present period of command
at Portsmouth, superintended the trials of armour
plates at the practice range in Porchester-creek.
The plates on trial consisted of one from Messrs.
John Brown and Co., of Sheffield, for the iron.'
cased ship Ocean, 15ft. in length by 3ft. 3in.
in
width and 41in. in thickness, and one 42in. plate
6ft. by 4, made under the steam hammer in Ports'
mouth Dockyard from a special quality of iron,
stated to be foreign, supplied by Messrs. Walton,
Sons, and Yates, of London. This last plate was
virtually destroyed by the first shot, and utterly so
by the second. The plate furnished by Messrs.
Brown, for the Ocean, underwent a very severe
testing by 13 shots (nine of which were edge blows,
in three instances overlapping each other), very
successfully, and fully maintained the reputation of
its manufacturers. To-morrow Captain Hewlett
will be succeeded in his duties as Superintendent
of the Royal Naval College and Captain of her
Majesty's ship Excellent by Captain Astley, C. 8.,
and will carry with him into his temporary retire-
ment general respect and esteem.
The Warrior, 40, iron frigate, Capt. Hon. A. A.
Cochrane, C. 8., in No. 10 Dock at Portsmouth, is
having a portion ofher bottom covered with Brown's
patent vitreous sheathing as an experiment. The
ship will be undocked about the 11th inst.
Yesterday Vice-Admiral Sir George Robert Lam-
bert, K.C.8., hoisted his flag, red at the fore, on
board Her Majesty's ship Cumberland, guard-ship
of the steam reserve at Sheerness, as Commander-
in-Chief at the Ncre, vice Sir W. J. Hope John-
stone, K.C.8., whose term of office has expired.
The flag of Vice-Admiral Johnstone was hauled
down at sunset from the Formidable (flagship), and
the flag of the new Vice-Admiral was removed to
the Formidable.
The Alert, 17, screw steam sloop, 751 tons, 100
horse-power, Commander Henry C. Magendie, and
the Columbine, 4, screw steam sloop, 669 tons, 150
horse-power, Commander Thomas L. H. Ward,
arrived at Sheerness yesterday to be refitted, after
which these vessels will proceed to the North for
the protection of the Scotch fisheries.
The Sphinx, 6, paddle, Commander Jones, arrived
at Spithead yesterday morning from China with the
crew of the despatch vessel Beagle (recently con-
demned in China) on board, and a few naval and
military invalids. She sailed from St. Helena on
the 11th of May, and called in at Fayal on the 24th
of June. Before she could let go her anchor, the
Sphinx was signalled to proceed round to the south
side of the Isle of Wight to the assistance of a small
passenger steamer on shore there. In the afternoon
she returned to Spithead, and dismantled will 'sail for
officers have been re-
Woolwich, where she will be and paid
out of commission.
Lleuts. the Hon. C.
The names of the following
N. p. F. Lthington, C. G. Harvey,
moved from the list of rallyoyal.Navy by order of
the Lords of the Admi.;7.
Cadogan ; Masters E. J. Mait-
land H. H. Tracy,
Sub-Lieuts. E. S. Watson, the
and the Hon. A. C.
voinstone, and W. E. Garnett ; Chief
land and T. OGYrieeri:
Assist.-Surg. S. H. Knaggs ;
Hon. G.
_payasters E. Weymouth and W,
fCte.llll-lo.onFa:Tey,
AsTshiltf.ollowing appointments were made at the Admiralty
Whittaker,.
to the Russell.
Commander IL 0.
Yerieraut!YJa.
Leach, to the • Liverpool.
Lieut, R.
B. Cay, to the Majestic.
Lo I