5*1 



widened in connection with this. The Town Planning Act is in operation at Sheffield, and 

 various districts are scheduled, but not yet developed. A new road along the Rivelin 

 Valley some three miles long has been made by the Water Committee of the corporation, 

 and the surplus land on each side is to be developed in accordance with modern town-planning 

 methods. The recent census returns confirm the trade statistics in their evidence of the 

 prosperity of South Wales and Monmouthshire, The counties of Monmouth and Glamorgan 

 show a higher percentage of increases of population than any other typically commercial 

 and industrial county in England and Wales. Between 1901 and 1911 the increase per cent 

 in Monmouthshire was no less than 32.8, or nearly double that in any English county; 

 Glamorgan makes a good second with 30.3 per cent. It is largely due to the rapid growth of 

 the chief centres of population that the housing conditions are so notoriously bad. The 

 local authorities are now trying to meet the need with municipal housing schemes, but despite 

 improvement in some towns the general conditions remain the worst in Britain. One 

 result is that according to the most recent statistics the infantile mortality rate in Car- 

 marthenshire, 136 per 1000 births, is the highest county rate in England and Wales, despite 

 the fact that the chief industry there is agriculture. 



Open Spaces. In 1912 the London County Council and the City Corporation decid- 

 ed to co-operate with the King Edward VII Memorial Committee with a view to the 

 conversion of the site of the Shadwell Fish Market into an open space for the purpose of 

 a memorial in the East End of London to King Edward VII. On February 19, 1910, 

 twelve additional acres of land adjoining Ruskin Park, Denmark Hill, were thrown open 

 for the use of the public. In the same year the London County Council decided to 

 acquire and preserve the Sir Robert Geffrey's Almshouses in Kingsland Road and cer- 

 tain property in Maria Street. The open space has been laid out and is known as 

 Geffrey's Garden. The Council have also decided to acquire the Grange estate, Kil- 

 burn. The estate extends to 85 acres, 7 of which are laid out as a park. 



The break up of large estates in the neighbourhood of Bournemouth, Lymington, 

 Portsmouth, Gosport, and other Hampshire towns, has enabled the public bodies to 

 acquire numerous open spaces, though it is to be regretted that around Bournemouth 

 and in the New Forest the picturesque features have suffered. Near the first-named 

 town, and on the Crown lands, woods have disappeared. A movement was started to 

 make the New Forest a sanctuary like Epping Forest, but was not supported by the 

 Hants County Council 



Loxley Chase (74 acres) has been presented to Sheffield as a public park. 



Public Buildings and Other Undertakings, London. 1 In October 1912, it was an- 

 nounced that the front of Buckingham Palace was shortly to be refaced in stone from 

 designs by Sir Aston Webb. The Queen Victoria Memorial, in front of the palace, was 

 completed and unveiled by the King on May 16, 1911. 



The King laid the foundation stone of a new County Hall, at the south end of West- 

 minster Bridge (Belvedere Road, Lambeth) on March 9, 1912. In the course of excava- 

 tions on the County Hal] site, the remains of a Roman boat were discovered, together 

 with various Roman objects. The boat and objects are preserved at the London Muse- 

 um, Kensington Palace, opened by the King on March 21, 1912. A stone bearing the 

 inscription " Lambeth Boundary of Pedlar's Acre, 1777," was also unearthed. 



Among other new London buildings may be mentioned the premises of the Royal 

 Society of Medicine (Wimpole Street), opened by the King on May 21, 1912; the lecture 

 hall and museum at the Hotniman Museum, Forest Hill (Jan. 27, 1912); and the 

 London Opera House in Kingsway (191-1). Mr. Oscar Hammerstein of New York, for 

 whom this opera house was built, decided to close it after his season in 191 2. Cinemato- 

 graph theatres are now subject to licence (Cinematograph Act, 1909), and about 250 

 halls have been licensed in London. The Young Men's Christian Association has 

 opened a new building in Tottenham Court Road, and with the object of disposing of the 



1 Among recent works on London, seec Sir Walter Besant, London North of the Thames 

 (1911), London South of the Thames (1912); Sir Laurence Gomme, The Making of London 

 (1912); E. Beresford Chancellor, Annals of Fleet Street (1912); Calendar of Letter Books 

 preserved among the archives of the Corporation of the City of London as the Guildhall (A-K) 

 (circa 1275-1464); The London County Council Various annual publications; The Survey 

 of London (Vol. iii: the Parish of St. Giles in the Fields) (1912); Indications of Houses of 

 historical Interest (parts i to xxxvi). 



