The Sun.
London, England, 1856-06-23 00:00:00

BOROUGH AND SPITA LFIELDS.

Since Monday last very moderate supplies of old potatoes
have come to hand, coastwise and by railway. For most
kinds the demand is inactive, yet prices are well sup-
ported. York Regents, 85s to 105 s per ton ; Kent and
Essex do., 70s to 85s ; Scotch do., 60s to 75s ; do. cups,
50s to 60s ; Lincolns, 60s to 70s ; blues, 50s to 60s ; mid-
dlings, 35s to 40s per ton. The imports of foreign pota-
toes have been 13,778 baskets from Rotterdam, which have
sold at 5s to 5s Gd per basket. New English are worth
10s to 12s per owt.

GORMAN INTERFERENCE AND THE
.NATIONA', uALLERY.

(From the Times.)

It is absolutely necessary that public attention
should at once be fixed in a vigorous and decisive
manner upon the attempt now in progress to bury
our national collection of pictures in a most unfa-
vourable site between Kensington and Brompton.
The bill which embodies this notable purpose stands
for consideration on Monday next. We entreat of
all members of the House of Commons who profess
themselves independent of Court favour to unite
at once in resistance to so preposterous a scheme.
After Monday next all further resistance may be
considered as hopeless. There are three distinct
projects for our consideration, and a fourth, not so
well defined, which, in this razing season, we may
characterise as " the field." The first is that of
removing tho collection to Kensington Palace. The
second is Prince Albert's plan for fixing it in the
space between the Kensington-road and Brompton.
The third is for pulling down the present structure
in Trafalgar-square, and for building on the site a
National Gallery worthy of the position and of the
English name. Under the fourth head we comprise
the various suggestions which have been offered
from time to time for fresh sites at different points
at the West-end. The most promising of these
is, perhaps, the southern aide of Pall-mall, or
rather that portion of it which lies between the
Carlton Club and St. James's Palace. This, if we
are rightly informed, is all Crown prOperty, and a
considerable section of it is actually occupied by
the Ordnance-office, the business of which will
shortly be transferred to Whitehall. Marlborough-
house is destined in a few years for the residence
of the Prince of Wales ; but, certainly, in Bur-
lington-house an excellent substitute might be
found in every way adapted for the residence of
the Heir Apparent. We would not, however, have
it supposed that we are arguing with any violent
force of conviction for the last-mentiened plan. it
may or may not, upon consideration, prove to be
the best ; the only point on which we are much
interested just now is to show that the site selected
at Brompton is the very worst.
. . _ .

The manner in which the conclusions of a select
committee of the House of Commons upon this sub-
ject are referred to in the third report of the Com-
missioners for the Exhibition of 1851 is unfortu-

nate enough. The parsons who drew up that re-
port are much to blame for having procured the
signature of the Prince Consort to statements
which are not quite in accordance with the facts.
Two resolutions were discussed before the commit-
tee of the House of Commons. The first involved
the policy of retaining the present site of the Na-
tional Gallery as a permanent site. This resolu-
tion was decided in the negative by a majority of
ten votes to one, the late Mr. Baring Wall being
the dissentient. The resolution, however, which
embodied the adoption of Prince Albert's plani was
not carried by a majority of ten to one, bnt of eix
to five, or in other words by a majority acme Now,
the disingenuousness in the 31 sport of the Cow mis-
sioners fur the Exhibition of 1851 consists in this,—
that the general conclusion of the committee, which
was in reality only carried by one voice, is spoken
of "as arrived at by a majority of ten votes to one,
the late Mr. Baring Wall being he only dissen-

tient." To thin report the signature of Prince
Albert is attached. But, even so, we have not
done. Mr. Moncktcu Manes, who made the
motion in favour of the Brompton site, did so in
the following form :—" That the position which
has been selected at the entrance of Kensington-
gardens would afford a better protection of the
works of art there collected from the evils of a
crowded neighbourhood, and would improve the
opportunity of erecting an edifice worthy of the
purpose." The committee, then, was fully aware
that the Kensington-gardens' site was the best, if
the pictures were to be taken out of town at all.
One would have supposed that its members would
not have given up the attempt without a struggle,
when the object in view was to obtain a Palace of
Arts worthy of the age and of the country. Not
a bit of it. They coolly add to the sentences we
have just quoted, "But your committee are fully
aware that the acquisition of such a site is attended
with difficulties they see no adequate means of
removing, and, in consequence, they are prepared
to recommend the acceptance of the offer of the
Commissioners." The offer was that of the
Prince Consort and of the Commission of 1851.
Under these circumstances, we call the particular
attention of the country and of the house to
the fact that the report of the select com-
mittee, upon which the Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer's bill is founded, embodies the dis-
tinct admission that the Kensington Gardens' site,
and not the site recommended, is the preferable
one. Even so, and with this important modifica-
tion, it appears the resolution was only carried in
select committee by a single voice. Now, can such
a miserable conclusion as this—so feebly supported
—be considered with any fairness as a basis for an
act of Parliamrnt which is to commit the country
to a site for its future Palace of Arts—a monu-
ment which may endure for centuries after the pre-
sent generation has passed away?
All that we ask for is timd for consideration.
We are drifting down upon a wrong site for our
National Gallery, as we have drifted down upon a
hundred other improper resolutions. The atten-
tion of the public has been so entirely occupied
for the last three years, until quite recently, with
the Russian war, and since then with the -unhappy
squabble with the United States, that we really
have not had time to turn round and consider
what had best been done is matters of m
Unleis the Government be so well advised as to
withdraw the bill on Monday night—a course
which to them would involve no disgrace, as it will
merely recognise the fact that time is wanted for
consideration—it will clearly be the duty of the
house to reject so hasty, so unfortunate, and ill-
advised a proposition. For ourselves we are not the
advocates of this or that particular scheme. If it
should appear to be the opinion of the majority of
well-informed persons that the pictures suffer from
our London atmosphere, we should acquiesce in their
being transferred to Kensington Gardens. We should
do so with the conviction that the number of visitors
would be sadly diminished in amount, and that the
privation would fall chiefly on the humbler classes.
For this we should be deeply grieved ; but still tl e
pictures must be spoiled, for in the end that would
be an injury to everybody. Should, it, on the
other hand, be made clear that the chief injury
suffered by the paintings depends upon questions
of temperature, &c., easily within the control of
the architects and guardians, we could have little
hesitation in saying that a central situation would
be far the best. Whether this site should be the
site of the present National Gallery, or a section of
the southern side of Pall-mall, or elsewhere, is a
point for argument and consideration. To be sure,
the site in Kensington Gardens would unite the
advantages as a pleasant rural walk for the humble
classes with the gratification they would derive
from the inspection of the pictures. They would
have to make a holiday of it, however, and forfeit
a day's wages, in order to procure for themselves
this enjoyment. Prince Albert's plan, however,
combines every conceivable disadvantage. lie
would remove the pictures to a distance from the
centre of the town, and plunge them into a moat
inconvenient locality, in which, whatever building
we may erect, will be simply buried. This ques-
tion of a proper site for our new Gallery of Art is
one of great moment to us all ; we look therefore
to our representatives to guard us from the hasty
and most improper decision embodied in the bill of
the Chancellor of the Exchequer, which is to be
discUssed on Monday night.

(From the Morning Advertiser.)
The pernicious influence of Coburgism at Court
continues to spread far and wide. It is making
itself felt as well as feared, not only in every de-
partment of the public service, but even in matters
which do not properly speaking belonging to the
Government. If it were to proceed with the same
rapidity with which it has made progress of late,
we should, before long, find ourselves as much
under its sway as if we were actually the inhabi-
tants of a German State.
Even the Times, which has long been the slavish
apologist of everything courtly, is at last beginning
to denounce this Germanism. The Times never
takes that course until it has ascertained that the
current of public opinion is running in a particular
direction. Then it throws itself into the stream,
and floats triumphantly on its
breast. When,
therefore, we see the Times hurling its denuncia-
tions boldly, broadly, and by name, at the head of
the highest German at Court, we may safely con-
clude that the cessation of this pernicious influence
in the councils of the Sovereign is nigh at
hand. The beginning of the end is come. Ger-
man supremacy has received the first of a series
of heavy blows, which, being repeated, must,
ere long, prove fatal. It is high time that
a consummation, so devoUtly to be wished,
were realised. The country, out of regard for
the highest personage in the realm has borne im-
measurably more than it would, under any other
conceivable class of circumstances, have done.
The exemption of the party from the punishment
which his unceasing interference in everything ap-
pertaining to the interests of the people of England
so richly merits would not have lasted so long
but for the devoted loyalty with which the Sove-
reign of England is regarded by her subjects. But
there are limits beyond which even loyalty cannot
insure public patience. Judging
.from the article
in the Times of Saturday, and winch we reproduce

in another part of our paper, those limits have at
last been reached.

We have long been unceasing in our efforts to.
expose the intrigues which were going on, under
the auspices of an illustrious German at Court, to
have a new National Gallery erected in a particular
place between Kensington Gardens and Brompton.
We showed that the inevitable result of transfer-
ring that great national institution to such a site,
would be to deprive the people of all opportunity
of seeing the pictures in the National Gallery.
The masses could not walk to and from that place,
except at great inconvenience and fatigue. Be-
sides, the loss of time alone, would be to the masses
an insuperable obstacle to an inspection of the pic-
tures at Brompton. The aristocracy, and the better
classes of the gentry—those who have ample leisure
on their bands, and the means in their pockets of
hiring a conveyance—assuming them not to have
one of their own—would, in such a case, have a
monopoly of the gratification which the inspection
of these pictures is calculated to afford.
That, indeed, is said to be the chief reason which
weighs with the Prince in wishing to have the Na-
tional Gallery transferred thither. Its present site
is so centrical that it attracts the masses, who come
between the wind and the nobility of Germanism.
But by transferring the National Gallery to the
neighbourhood of Brompton, it would become
practically inaccessible to the multitude. So far
as the majority of the masses,in the metropolis are
concerned, there might as well be no National
Gallery at all, as that it should be on the site fixed
on, according to the Times, in " Prince Albert's
plan." And yet the National Gallery is, by a sort
of fiction, represented •as the people's. If paying
for it constitutes a right of property, the National
Gallery is certainly theirs. It was built; and is
kept up, at their expense. And yet Prince Albert
would prohibit the masses from ever crossing its
threshold, by erecting a new building in a place
too far off to be within their reach. This may le
the German way of managing matters, but it
is not the English. Let us add, that we will
continue to manage our own matters after our own
fashion.

The scheme of the Prince must be knocked on
the head, and that, too, this very evening. There
is no necessity for removing the National Gallery
from its present site. Throw down the existing
building if you will, and erect one worthy of the
country, but let the new edifice be on the site of
the present one. It is sheer nonsense to talk about
the pictures being injured by the atmosphere of
London. In that case, what comes of the fine pic-
tures in the almost adjoining house of the Duke of
Northumberland ? What, also, becomes of those
in the mansions of others of the nobility in various
parts of London ? The thing is a mere pretext.
Li the absence of admissible reasons for the re-
moval of the National Gallery to the vicinity of
Brompton, it is made to please the Prince. Sir
Michael Faraday and Sir David Brewster—two of
the most eminent authorities of the day in matters
of this nature—have severally given their decided
assurance that the paintings in the National Gal-
lery do nt t sustain any injury from the smoke of
London or the atmosphere of Charing-cross.
Let us, then, adopting the language of the
Times of Saturday, " entreat of all members of the
House of Commons who profess themselves inde-
pendent of Court favour to unite at once in resist-
ance to so preposterous a scheme. After Monday
next (this day) all further resistance may be con-
sidered. as hopeiess." "Prince Albert's plan com-
bines every concAivable disadvantage. He would
remove the pictures to a distance from the centre
of the town, and plunge them into a most incon-
venient locality, in which whatever building we
may erect will be simply buried. This question of
a proper site for our new Gallery of Art is one of
great moment to us all ; we lolk therefore to our
representatives to guard 'us from the hasty and
most improper decision emboli 3d in the bill of the
Chancellor of the Exchequer,- which is to be dis-
cussed on Monday (this) night."

Tne Prince Consort receives a sever* censure
from the Times, hitherto the most abject of the para-
sites of his Royal Highness, in the passage which
follows :—"The manner in which the conduct of a
Select Committee of the House of Commons upon
this subject is referred to in the third report of
the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851
is unfortunate enough. The persons who drew
up that report are much to blame for having
procured the signature of the Prince Consort
to statements which are not quite in accordance
with the facts. Two resolutions were discussed be-
fore the Committee of the House of Commons.
The first involved the policy of retaining the
present site of the National Gallery as a perma-
nent site. The resolution was decided in the nega-
tive by a majority of ten votes to one, the late Mr.
Baring Wall being the dissentient. The resolution,
however, which embodied the adoption of Prince
Albert's plan was not carried by a majority of ten
to one, but of six to five, or, in other words, by a
majority of one."
The obvious meaning here is, not that the Prince
was influenced by others, but that his views being
previously known on the question, the parties re-
ferred to drew up their report in accordance with
them. But in order that our readers may see the
article of the Times in all its bearings, we insert
it, as already mentioned, in another part of our
paper.
We only add, in conclusion, that Hon. Gentle.
men who may vote this night against the removal
of the National Gallery need not be afraid of
thereby incurring the displeasure of Ministers.
They are supporting the Kensington and Brompton
plan of the Prince, not because they approve of it,
but because a pressure is put upon them. They
will speak and vote this night in favour of the
German site, not spontaneously, but under the
coercion of circumstances they cannot control ;
and, consequently, those members who will vote
against Ministers will render them a service for
which they will ever feel the deepest gratitude.

OPENING OF THE STIV;01) AND MAIDS

STONE R4ILWAY.

ANOTHER ACCOUNT.

The opening of the line from Strood to Maidstone, a
railway communicAtion which has long been desired by
the inhabitants of the central district of Kent, was cele-
brated by an entertainment at the Corn Exchange in
Maidstone, on Wednesday, presided over by the Mayor
of the town.

The town of Maidstone, although it has had for years
past the convenience of railway communication with
the metropolis, has suffsired from its very circuitous
route. Within a distance of something like 80 miles
from London, its population has, not from any fault
of the South-Eastern Company, been obliged to run
round by Paddock-wood and Reigate to London-
bridge, not less than 56 miles ; and a not less
inconvenient matter to them Las been that
they have been comparatively shut out commercially
from Rochester, Chatham, Strood, and Gravesend.
The passenger-traffic between Rochester, Strood, and
Chatham and Maidstone is very large ; and looking at
the fact that railway communication usually trebles such
traffic, there can be no doubt, considering the heavy
character of the road between the points, that the mile-
age receipts over the newly-opened line will be as large
as that upon the North Kent line proper, of which this
may be considered an extension. The Strood and Maid-
stone line is of further public value, inasmuch as it
places Rochester, Strood, and, we may add, Graves-
end, in railway ommunication with the whole of the
country through which the Brighton and SOuth-Wes-
tern Railways extend ; while it supplies, until the
East Kent line shall be completed, a through rail-
way transit between the places named, and Folke-
stone, Dover, Margate, Ramsgate, and Deal. The
Strood and Maidstone branch runs out of the old
Strood Railway, a short distance from the Strood station,
which it necessarily, from the physical character of the
country, leaves on the left—that is, between the new'
line and the Medway'. In passing the old station a
very picturesque view of Rochester is obtained, with the
old low stone bridge and the almost completed bridge
of the East Kent Railway Company to the left, and
the cathedral and the ancient " keep' somewhat to the
right ; while the Kentish hills, which are seen running
on the Rochester side of the Medway, for miles into
the centre of the country, present many phases of
scenery of the most pleasing variety. These hills and
the Medway are, comparatively, parallel with the
railway nearly the whole of the distance, and with the
exception of the line between Bristol and Exeter, the
TrentYalley, the South Wales, and Chester and Holyhead
lines, there are few branch lines of the same extent where
such a rich diversity of • scenery is presented. Con-
tinually-recurring orchards, verdant hop grounds, and
meandering rivers, pretty little glens, high ranges o
hillq, extensive views, embowered churches, and ancien
architectural remains alternate through the entire 11
miles ; and although the many beautiful spots throng
which the line passes may be familiar to the inhabitants
of the localities, and possibly he, from familiarity, not
exceedingly interesting to them, we are quite sure that.
many thousands of our metropolitan friends will annually
run over the railway, and enjoy the natural beauties with
which the country traversed by it abounds. There is but
one short heavy work on the line—a cutting which
requires considerable dressing for security to the work-
ing of the line, and that elressing, we learn, will b
immediately proceeded with. The line runs chiefly
through Kentish rag stone, with a little cutting through
chalk at the Strood end. The permanent way has been
admirably laid. It is solid and of an endurable cha-
racter, and will require little or no draining. The
whole of the stations, bridges, &c., are of ironstone, or
brick, and we do not recollect having passed over a line
—and we have gone over many thousands of miles'of
railway—where the " permanence " of the works has
been more wisely
attended to. At Maidstone the com-
pany will erect a new station at a level higher than that
of the present station, and their object is to afford more
convenient accommodation at the point where,the main
street crosses the sine at right angles.