May 14, 1891] 



NATURE 



2>7 



January 



February 



March 



April 



May 



June 



27 (5)) 

 24(5) 

 28(4) 

 28(7) 

 27(7) 

 26(8) 



11890. 



July 24 (2) 



August 30 (8) 

 September 29 (7) 

 October 24 (5) 

 November 22 (i) 

 December 30 



If these numbers be compared with the curves, it will 

 be found that in a rough way they agree with them ; the 

 diminishing number of these low readings every autumn, 

 no less than their increase towards the summer, being 

 obviously correlated with the rise and fall of the curves. 

 F. H. Perry Coste. 



THE SCIENCE MUSEUM AND GALLERY OF 

 BRITISH ART AT SOUTH KENSINGTON. 



"W" I GO ROUS protests continue to be made against the 

 * appropriation, for the new Gallery of British Art, 

 of the site which ought to be used, as originally intended, 

 for the Science Museum. Several letters on the subject by 

 men of high authority have been printed in the Times j 

 and on Tuesday a deputation, which could not but com- 

 mand attention and respect, waited upon Lord Cranbrook 

 and Mr. Goschen to represent to them the opinions held 

 by all who are in a position to form a trustworthy judg- 

 ment on the question. The Government are still en- 

 gaged in considering the matter, and it is to be hoped 

 that they are receiving and giving heed to the counsel of 

 their natural advisers, although, unfortunately, this is 

 a priori extremely doubtful. 



We print the letters addressed to the Times by Sir F. 

 Bramwell, Mr. Poynter, and Sir J. Coode, and an account 

 of the proceedings of the deputation on Tuesday. 



It has for many years been recognized that the science col- 

 lections at South Kensington are housed in a manner which 

 largely diminishes their value for their principal use — viz. that 

 in connection with the Royal Normal School of Science. 



This school, as every one knows, is, as regards its main build- 

 ing, situated on the east side of Exhibition Road, while the 

 collections are scattered about in the South Gallery and in the 

 West Gallery adjacent to Queen's Gate. 



In 1885 the Government appointed an inter-departmental 

 committee to consider the subject and to report, and they 

 nominated me, as being unconnected with any department, 

 chairman of the committee. The committee (with one dis- 

 sentient) reported in the sense that on the land lying west of 

 Exhibition Road, and between that road and Queen's Gate, suit- 

 able buildings should be erected according to a complete design, 

 but that they should be carried out in successive portions. 

 Nothing was done on this report. 



In 1889 another committee was appointed ; this committee 

 made very similar recommendations, and last year the Govern- 

 ment acquired further land. 



There are now on the west side of Exhibition Road, and 

 immediately opposite the science schools, the observatories used 

 by Mr. Norman Lockyer, and also a newly-erected physical 

 laboratory. 



Everything seemed to be, after all these years of waiting, in 

 train for affording the needed accommodation, when, incredible 

 as it must appear, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced 

 that the whole of this well-considered and satisfactory arrange- 

 ment is to be given up. He stated it had been determined to 

 sweep away the observatories and the physical laboratory, 

 already on the west side of the road, and close to the science 

 schools, and to devote this particular plot of ground to a picture 

 gallery. I look upon this as a most disastrous proceeding, and 

 one that, in the interest of the great National Department at 

 South Kensington, should not be entertained for one moment. 



Any one who will take the pains to visit the ground, or even 

 to look at an accurate plan of it, will see that there is plenty of 

 good space available for the picture gallery without interfering 

 with the needs of the science collection, and that the notion of 

 building it where proposed is so thoroughly preposterous that, 

 as our American friends say, it must have originated in " pure 

 cussedness." Frederick Bramwell. 



No. 5 Great George Street, Westminster, May 9. 



NO. II 24, VOL. 44] 



Sir Frederick Bramv^tell in his letter of this morning 

 points out the disastrous efifect on the interests of the national 

 Department of Science at South Kensington which will result 

 from the intrusion of the new Gallery of British Art, to be 

 planted precisely on the spot where it will cause the greatest 

 amount of inconvenience. To an artist a still more flagrant 

 instance of " pure cussedness " in this matter would appear to 

 be that the building should be placed where it can have no con- 

 nection with the existing galleries, when there is a piece of 

 ground higher up the road in immediate connection with them. 



The galleries on the east and west of the Horticultural 

 Gardens, which were built for pictures at the time when there 

 was a scheme for holding annual international exhibitions, are, 

 whether by a happy "fluke" or by careful calculation on the 

 part of their constructor, General Scott, without doubt the best 

 lighted and the best proportioned picture galleries that have 

 ever been constructed in England. Sir Frederick Leighton has, 

 I know, expressed this opinion, and every artist who exhibited 

 in these galleries during the three or four years that the exhibi- 

 tions were held there will, I believe, agree in it : "We never 

 saw our pictures look so well." These galleries are even now 

 being connected by a building crossing the intervening space, 

 the lower half of which will belong to the Imperial Institute, 

 while the upper part is to be available for purposes of exhibition, 

 thus making a connected group, and what would appear to be 

 an unrivalled building for the purposes of a Gallery of British 

 Art. 



Why these buildings, acknowledged to be as good as they can 

 be, and actually ready on the spot, should not be used for this 

 purpose, according to what I understand was the original and 

 nearly accepted scheme, it is somewhat difficult to understand. 

 If the building for which ;^8o,coo has been so liberally offered 

 were placed higher up the road, above the Technical Institute, 

 where there is a piece of ground available, it would back imme- 

 diately on the Eastern Gallery, in which the Indian collection is 

 now housed, thus affording provision for the extension of the 

 collection, which is growing annually by the addition of the 

 pictures purchased under the Chantrey bequest, and to which 

 it is certain that further considerable additions will constantly 

 be made by gift and bequest as soon as there is a place in which 

 they can be properly and permanently exhibited. 



Also, there is for once, if advantage be taken of it, an oppor- 

 tunity for carrying out a reasonable and consistent scheme for 

 both science and art. Edward J. Poynter, R.A. 



28 Albert Gate, S.W., Mky 11. 



Having served on the Committee on Machinery and Inven- 

 tions in connection with the Science and Art Department of the 

 Committee of Council on Education, I desire most emphatically 

 to endorse the protest of Sir Frederick Bramwell which appears 

 in your columns of this day's date. 



Although the fees received from patentees up to the end of 

 1885 exceeded the expenditure of the Patent Office by upwards 

 of 2\ millions sterling, nothing practically has been done to put 

 the Patent Museum and Museum of Machinery and Inventions 

 in an efficient condition. 



Year after year the Committee, of which I am a member, has 

 urged that more space should be given to the authorities at South 

 Kensington, and now, when it was thought the recommendations 

 were about to be realized, it is asserted that the promised site is 

 to be devoted to a picture gallery. 



I sincerely trust that this intention may not be carried out, but 

 that the site in question, which exactly faces the Royal College 

 of Science, will be appropriated for the science collections, to 

 which purpose it has long been assigned. 



Jno. Coode, President. 



The Institution of Civil Engineers, 25 Great George Street, 

 Westminster, May 11. 



The deputation which waited upon Lord Cranbrook, 

 the Lord President of the Council, and Mr. Goschen 

 was large and representative. Mr. Plunket, M.P., First 

 Commissioner of Works, was also present. Among the 

 deputation were : Sir William Thomson (President of the 

 Royal Society), Sir Bernhard Samuelson, M.P., Sir 

 George Gabriel Stokes (Past President of the Royal 

 Society), Mr. C. Acland, M.P., Sir Frederick Bramwell, 

 F.R.S., Prof. Story-Maskelyne, M.P., Sir Douglas Galton, 

 C.B., Mr. Poynter, R.A., Prof. Unwin, Mr. Francis 



