The Sun.
London, England, 1859-08-24 00:00:00

of the National Gallery. We are beholding, year
after year, upon tho other, what " sunken wreck
and sumless treasury" may go down and disappear,
as in the vortex of an insatiable whirlpool, in
the instance of the new Houses of Parliament. Be-
sides, we know now beyond a moment's further
doubt, that the Gothic style of architecture in this
northern climate (for that matter it might be said
in any climate), with its incontestible spen dour and
beauty, has no less incontestibly abundant sources
of inconvenience. It is the very perfection of all
orders of architecture, if you will, for ecclesiastical
structures, for Christian churches and cathedrals.
When so applied, it is, in truth, as COLERIDGE
described it poetry in stone frozen music
There, under its sculptured roof beams, in those
edifices dedicated to the adoration of GOD—there
may be, there unquestionably is, a supplementary
charm, an additional attribute of the beautiful in
what MILTON sang of as " a dim religious light.'►
A " darkness visible," singularly inappropriate and

inconvenient, however, in any other public structure
than a church or a cathedral. Sir CHARLES BARRY has
taught us that, among other now admitted truths
in return for our £3,000,000 or £4,000,000. Re-
membering which, it may be as well to apply the
knowledge we have thus gained, the knowledge
we have thus purchased—now that we are about
to begin in earnest the erection of a lordly pile of
public offices for the use of the various departments
of the Government in Whitehall and Westminster.
An evident disposition to act wisely in this way
has already to some extent been manifested by the
present Government. The Prime Minister, we
have seen, has declared point-blank against the
Gothic style—avowing, for very sensible rea-
sons clearly stated, a decided preference for the
Classic or the Rennaissance. So far, so good. But
Ministers will have to go a little further. While
deciding thus they must, above all things, act with
the strictest justice to the competitors. Mr.
FITZROY in this particular is called upon to
repair the error inaugurated, it may be inad-
vertently inaugurated, but still inaugurated,
by his predecessor (Lord JOHN MANNERS) under
the late Administration. Let the Chief Commis-
sioner then observe clearly, before it is yet too late,
how the matter really stands ! When last year
(1858) the commission granted to the Government
architect (Mr. PENNETHORNE) was rescinded, and
the project placed, as it ought to have been at the
very outset, in the hands of the principal com-
petitors—who was the party selected from
among the leading group of prizemen ? A first?
A second? No—it was a third prizeman (Mr.
SCOTT) who was chosen, and for this very com-
prehensible reason—Mr. SCOTT, the winner of
that third prize, had adopted the Gothic style
which, above all, was the favourite style par ex-
cellence in the estimation of Lord JOHN MANNERS,
then Chief Commissioner. But now that a classic
style, instead of a Gothic style, has been made
choice of by Lord PALMERSTON, the matter
obviously stands quite differently. Both first
and second prizemen have then, surely, prior
claims to a third, and that third, a Gothic prizeman
—who is still, however retained as A 1, though third
on the list, and though his success as such was
wonby a Gothic design. It is true that those winners
of a second prize, Messrs BANKS and B A RRY,
have some sort of anticipative compensation in that
commission which has been accorded to them for
the Academy Buildings to be erected upon part of
the /316 x of Burlington -Rouge, Piccadilly. But how
about Mr. GARLING, a first prizeman ? We, who
know nothing whatever of that gentleman
personally, have never heard of his getting
any further notice than the comparatively
empty award of that bauble of a first
prize without a whisper of a commission. Ac-
cording to which mode of arrangement the results
of the competition are, apparently, to go for
nothing. The round man is to be put into the
square hole again—the square man is to be put into
the round hole—and one of the first men, one of the
foremost men, one of the chief prizemen among the
competitors—the only one we believe chosen
unanimously—is to be put, just nowhere. Is this
just ? Is it wise ? Is it generous ? We submit
that here are reasons for the reoonsideration of
the whole of the existing arrangements by Lord
PALMERSTON, as First Lord of the Treasury, and
by Mr. FITZROY, as Chief Commissioner.

" Men on strike" have seldom met with fairer
treatment from the press, and from the public
generally, than the building trades on the present
occasion. There has been every disposition to give
them their due, to maintain their rights, and not
only their rights but their fair moral claims. It
cannot be said that the middle and upper classes
have been at all too ready to take part with the
masters against their men. It is obviously for the
interest of all of us, pecuniarly, that the men
should work as cheaply as they can. Ultimately
we must all get better houses for our money in
proportion to the smallness of the cost of them to
the builder. Yet all have discussed the subject
without a thought of anything but of what is fair
between master and man.

We have already shown that we could not com-
mend the plan adopted by the workmen—that of
forming themselves into large corporations to give
orders to all the workmen in the employ of any
master, which orders must be obeyed at all costs
and inconveniences to master or to man. This, as
the declaration put forth by the masters shows,
is the pith of the dispute. \lre observe that 31r.
EDWIN JAMES has condemned the declaration as
" most arbitrary and unjust." But even if the
masters' terms will bear this character, what
led to their being proposed ? Just the ar-
bitrary and unjust terms exacted by an
authority which certainly has no equitable claim
to direct the proceedings of persons employed
by another. It is a truth stamped with very high
authority, indeed, that "no man can serve two
masters," and all experience proves it a truth. The
builders have, indeed, absurdly pretended that their
unions are but clubs for their support and relief in
times of sickness and affliction. Were that really
the case the dispute about a declaration would soon
be at an end. Every master is anxious to encou-
rage such clubs and savings banks, and every thing
that makes his men thrifty—such men are always
his most trust worthy hands. Let, then, every rule
in the Trades Unions be abrogated but such as re-
late to mutual succour and relief, and the de-
claratian would be waste paper. It is pro-

posed merely as the necessary counterpart of the
declaration explicitly or virtually made by the
workmen in joining the union which would control
the masters. These declarations, which practically
limit the work the more skilful and industrious can
do, and those which require all the men to turn out
of a yard if a man be introduced not belonging to
a union, appear to us to be " most arbitrary and
unjust" indeed ; and surely masters are justified in
resisting to the last such tyranny and slavery.
It seems to us that it is here the concession m:.st
begin. The workmen took the first false step in
converting their benevolent unions into engines for
only their masters, but all workmen
woppressing
not d
not join them. We put it to any English-
man free from partisanship phpo r
in the matter, whether
would be done by, when every
it is doing as we wou-