The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1843-03-21 00:00:00

THE POLYTECHNIC 00CIETY,

ON THE PUBLIC IMPROVEMENTS OF LIVERPOOL

(Continuation of Mr. Samuel Hamer: Lecture.)
The next great improvement was the widenidg of Lord-
Ptreet. And here a serious mistake was made. The act of
puViament gave power to widen, but our local governors failed
to Riribellish. The north side remains, with a few exceptions,
us it was originally built, and there are 50 different elevations,
with hardly one building deserving the character of handsome..
And on the south side, which was entirely re-built, how
meagre is the architecture ! Here was a noble line of 1,000 feet,
which might have been rendered ornamental; but instead of
a noble range of edifices, with projections of a bold and nervous
description—instead of columns, carrying entablatures which
would have given pleasure.to the eye to repose upon, instead
of the light and graceful attic, in all the harmony and elegance
of just proportion—we have a flimsy and meagre range of
edifices, with scanty pilasters. with miserable entablatures.
with not a single parapet to cover the hideous roofs, and many
of the buildings have been so slightly constructed, that they
are even now dependent on their neighbours for mutual sup-

port.
Let us now look at Dale-street, and what do we discover?
Width has undoubtedly been obtained, and so tar, it has
proved a public convenience. But lam anxious:to establish
the fact, that you may administer to public convenience, and
yet, you may do nothing to establish public taste, or elevate
our character for the desire of public beauty. With a few
exceptions, some of those faulty in many essential points, the
so-termed improvement in Dale-street has not caused the
erection of a single edifice that can claim any merit as an
architectural production, and without specifying particular
objects which might be considered invidious : I must remark,
that in many of the thoroughfares which have been widened,
elevations have been permitted that would not be creditable
to the back settlements of America. Surely it is the duty of
our local governors to take care that something more than
width is obtained, when more than £lOO,OOO has been ex-
pended for the improvement of a single thoroughfare. As to
Tythebarn-street, I trust not myself to make a single remark
on this abortion. Those who directed the improvement of
this great thoroughfare, must have been studying the analysis
of beauty, and have come to the determination, that the
greater the diversity the greater the grace, and that the more
frequent the departure from straight lines, and sweeping
curves, the more striking would be the effect, and the more
overpowering the elegance.
I turn with greater pleasure to Fenwick-street. Here
we have something of better character--here we have several
specimens worthy of the name of architecture : and when the
whole of this street is completed, although it will not present
a very imposing appearance, yet there will be little to offend,
and much to praise.
South Castle-street is much en a par with Lord-street ; it
is a piece of patchwork ; and, if variety be charming, then
must every man be delighted with its appearance. 1 might
extend these remarks considerably, but I am not desirous of
criticising individual erections. The great point which we
must be anxious to see remedied is the general improvement
of the town ; and, although you need not be told that it is the
aggregate of individual erections that forms the general im-
provement—just as the multitudes of atoms forms the moun-
tain, or the aggregate of drops produces the ocean—yet I for-
bear particularizing, lest I should injure the professional
reputation of many whom 1 much respect, and who have, in
too many instances, been chained down by that inordinate
love for cheapness to which I have already adverted. I ask
you then to cast your eyes on Bennison's or Gage'a map of
Liverpool, and look at the acute and obtuse angles which are
formed by the eccentric divergements of our streets. There
are scarcely two leading throughfares running parallel with
each other; street grows out of street in the most extraordi-
nary manner, without any apparent design ;—and it has been
observed with as much facetiousness as truth, that Liverpool
was originally laid out by the cows, who formed a track in
their way to. their pasturage, which track became a footpath,
which grew into a lane, and which was magnified into a street.
This original defect in laying out our thoroughfares is the
reason why so many of our public edifices are in such awk-
ward positions. The Town-hall, I have already observed, is
not in the centre of Castle-street. St. George's Church
stands awry both with Castle-street and Lord-street. The
beautiful Chapel of St. James's Cemetery is askew with both
of its leading approaches. St. Luke's is similarly situated ;
and I might multiply examples if they were not familiar to us
all. But in making these remarks, to which I have been re-
luctantly forced, that I might do justice to my subject. it is
right that I should be impartial, and congratulate you on the
progress of the last few years. When we recollect that SO
years ago that part of the town within a line drawn from
Queen-street down Oldhall-street, along Castle-street,
South Castle-street and the north side of Canning-place, then
the Old Dock, was the most densely populated part of Li-
verpool ;—that our merchants sought the suburban districts
of Hanover-street and Wolstenholme-square, the east side
of which commanded a lovely view of smiling fields, now co-
vered by Bold-street, and a charming hill, blooming with
beauty, vegetation, and foliage, now better known as
Rodney-street and Clarence-street--or when they sought the
more rural districts of Duke-street or St. Paul's-square, to
escape from the noise and bustle of the town ;—and when we
look at the position of these once favoured spots—the man-
sions of the merchants converted into offices, their gardens
covered with manufactories or with residences. the ancient
houses of our shopkeepers and traders almost all destroyed,
and piles ofoffices, suites of svarehouses and all the conveniences
of modern commerce erected on their sites, when the eight
acres of dock space has grown into 100, and the population
has increased from a mere handful to about 250,000. When
we recollect the many stately piles that have sprung up, tor
worship,e the asylums called into exist-
encenevolence, the edifices reared by
pu r pobsyestho
the emotions
reemliogtioiounssofbenevolence,
the successful pursuits of honourable exertion, and for our
extended commerce, these and a hundred other recollections
are pleasing, and with these recollections we must desire to
see blended, those delineations of beauty, which are or ought
to be in harmony with such unprecedented growth. I attri-
bute much of the increase of our local taste during the last
few years to the sure, but silent, operation of our Athenaeum,
and of the Royal institution, in which we now assembled,
to the annual exhibition of the works of our living artists—
to the various scientific institutions which have been estab-
lished—to the spread of knowledge—the improvements in
mechanical science, and much of it, I believe, has grown out
of the elegant and accomplished mind of Mr. Roscoe, and
was extended by his beautiful address .at the opening of the
Royal Institution ; and as example is a great teacher, our
architectural taste began to be improved when the beautiful
Grecian portico which adorns this building was erected, for
it was speedily followed by many others of kindred charac-
ter, and an impetus was given to our public taste, which has
been extending slowly, but surely; and whether since the
peace our intercourse with the continent has improved our
national morals, I do not now stop to
inquire ; but certain I
am, that it has corrected and improved our national taste in
architecture, painting, and sculpture.
The shops of this town, though often disfigured by whim-
sicalities; which are mistaken for beauties, are yet prodigi-
ously improved of late years.
Let any one compare the shop fronts of Castle-street, or
of Lord-street, with the more modern fronts of Bold-street,
and a few other places, and the improvement will be percep-
tible. The decrease in the price of plate glass has been an
important circumstance to our designs for shops, and I hope
that in this department of our domestic or shop architecture
an increased purity of taste and boldness of design will be-
come every day more perceptible. lam aware that by a de-
cision of our Highway Board, which I am not about to
bim-
pugn, and which prevents a projection of pilaster and cornice
beyond a specified distance from the vertical line of a front,
many architects are prevented from launching a bold design ;
yet, within the specified line, if there be not space for archi-
tectural boldness, there is at least space for the exercise of
good taste.
Our dwelling-houses would open a wide field for observa-
tion ; but as they scarcely come under the head of public im-
provements, I must refrain from any
ings of a private character. observations on build_
Our churches, however, may require a few words.
Our ancestors had a laudable pride in makint their places of
worship worthy of the name. They considered that temples
erected to the great Father of all should be of a character su.
perior to other edifices, and while they were content to dwel
in houses of an inferior character and description to the man,
sions of more modern days, they never erected a building to
the honour of God, without making it, as far as they were
able, worthy of the high service to which it was dedicated.
The vaulted chancel, the lofty.nave, the pointed windows,
softened and beautified with stained glass, the stately tower,
or the lofty spire, on which were lavished the skill of the ar-
chitect, these are all characteristic of our ancient churches
but in how few instances does this noble and disinterested
spirit animate us in the present day.
Nothwithstanding the extension of our commerce and ma-
nufactures, and the great increase of our national wealth, our
churches have suffered a material deterioration, which must
be evident to all. Instead of raising edifices such as our
forefathers did, the grand object of the present day seems to
be, how an ornamental barn can be erected, ornamental in
the worst possible manner, where persons can be pewed to.
gether for £3 a sitting. The ecclesiastical character of our
churches has not been sufficiently attended to; and examples
are not wanting in this town and neighbourhood of buildings
being erected for churches of which our forefathers would
have been ashamed. The truth is, that cheapness has been
the grand desideratum, and so long as this is the case, we can
only deplore the circumstance. In.too many instances where
the ecclesiastical character has been in some measure attended
to, many of the buildings are so barbarous in their external
appearance, and are constructed in such a flimsy manner,
that many of the churches built in the 14th, 15th, and 16th
centuries, which are now grey with age, will be in existence
and will be stable erections long after some of our modern
churches have fallen into decay. And here I cannot avoid
remarking that a singular approximation is fast taking place
throughout the kingdom between the modern buildings
erected by the dissenters and those erected by churchmen for
the purposes of divine worship. Our dissenting countrymen
are increasing the splendour of their chapels, and instead of
the plain brick buildings which they formerly erected, are
calling in the graces of architecture and sculpture, and bor-
rowing, in many instances, the ecclesiastical character so
long employed by churchmen only. Not to travel out of our
town, the new chapels at the Crescent, in Pembroke-place,
and in Great George-street, are illustrations of the former,
and several minor edifices, together with those erecting in
Hope-street and Canning-street, are proofs of the latter.
I do not say that churchmen are called on to erect edifices
such as the splendid cathedrals which adorn our land ; but I
do aver, that our churches should present a better and more
striking appearance than many of them do, and that the
scanty and thrifty spirit, which is unfortunately too prevalent
in the present day, ought to give way to a more expansive
benevolence, and that our sacred edifices should not be made
the architectural sacrifice offered oq the altar of niggardli-

ness.
The abandonment of stone in too many instances has caused
a deterioration both in our public and private edifices.
Whatever belongs to a building, is capable of receiving the
impression of design, and may be made to co-operate in the
cultivated or refined expression of that building as a whole.
But when, for the sake of economy, we are driven to abandon
a material which, both in appearance and in reality, is con-
nected with solidity and durability, and are obliged to con-
struct all our mouldings and projections merely of plaster,
bearing the name of Roman cement, without any of its qua-
lities, which becomes, in a short time, a piece of painted or
whitewashed patchwork,
an incongruity is the inevitable re-
sult, and that character for durability is destroyed which
ought ever to accompany design, and by which the general
taste of one age is transmitted to its successors.
Much of the evil which I have often lamented, will, I
doubt not, be removed by the better education of the middle
classes—by the increased attention which is paid to pictorial
composition—to elemer4illy drawing—and to the higher cul-
tivation which our public schools is likely to engender, not
only as schools of design, but as seminaries to inculcate a
purer taste, by
directing the attention of the middle ranks in
a great degree to classical. studies, and to acquaintance with ,
the models of antiquity and wherever this has been the case,
as in Edinburgh, for example, the effect is seen in public im-
provements, because society is a orowd in motion, and it is
in the nature of things that those who, by intellectual
achievements force themselves forwards beyond the common
pace must attract attention, and those who feel the jostle
must either mend their own pace or be left behind.
Few persons
can have an idea of the wonderful and mag-
ents made during the last ten years at
nificent iinprovern
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and has been effected through the
instrumentality of one original and expansive mind. From
having been an ill-built and most inconvenient town, with
narrow, dingy streets, it seems as if, by the wand of an en-
chanter, one of the ancient cities of Greece bad been again
and suddenly transplanted into Nor-
called into existence,
thumberland. Wide and snacious thoroughfares, hand
.some
squares and crescents, public edifices of great convenience
and beauty, streets of beautiful dwellings in all the harmony
of regular design, and arranged with architectural skill, con-