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THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



QOCTOBEB, 



THE BRITISH MDSEUM. 



Whether the British Museum he altogetlier so defective in point 

 of accommodation as j\lr. Ferjrusson represents it, or not, certain 

 it is, that any further increase of accommodation — and it is already 

 hef^inninjr to be required— is rendered impracticable, in conse- 

 (|uence of so much space that niifrht have been rendered available 

 being now so disposed of that it cannot be built upon at all. It is 

 somewhat extraordinary that the great advantage, both archi- 

 tecturally and otherwise, that might have been derived from bring- 

 ing the principal portico and general line of front nearly up to the 

 street, so as to be in advance of the main body of the edifice, which 

 being completely shut out from view, might then have been 

 wholly, as it is now partially, of brick, — it is extraordinary, we 

 say, that it sliould not have struck if not Sir Robert Smirke him- 

 self, at least some one or other among those to whom he submitted 

 his designs. 



It was not too late even when the present facade was about to 

 l)e commenced, to adopt such plan, for it would not at all have 

 interfered witli the general plan as now executed, although it 

 would greatly have enlarged and otherwise improved it; and gal- 

 leries and rooms which are now complained of as being imperfectly 

 lighted owing to there being colonnades before them, would have 

 been relieved from such obstructions. Unluckily, however, it was 

 then deemed advisable by many-headed wisdom not to comply with 

 the demand for the model of the intended facade being exhibited to 

 the public; although, however impertinent the demand itself was, 

 the refusal was infinitely more ungracious, if nothing worse. The 

 Trustees were sulky — were determined to stave off criticism as 

 long as they possibly could, and by such manoeuvring have now 

 got a very sulky-looking though would-be-classical structure, 

 which criticism treats very unceremoniously, and not without 

 reason. 



Some time ago, an idea was shown in thi^ Journal — not very 

 satisfactorily, indeed — for imparting greater variety and dignity to 

 the colonnaded facade, by making the central octastyle of the 

 Corinthian order, and carrying it up higher than the rest. Yet, 

 as it happens, it is perhaps better that Smirke's design was ad- 

 hered to, unless alteration had been extended a great deal further. 

 To make anything consistently grand and of uniformly classical 

 character with the dwelling-houses which he has planted out as 

 wings — and in which the donkey-ears of Cockneyism stick out 

 from the lion's hide of Hellenic lonicism, at once ludicrously and 

 lamentably, — would have been impossible. If the present facade 

 he not a wretchedly bad composition, it can be only because it is 

 no composition at all, but a mere jumbling together of archi- 

 tectural incoherences, and some of them of an exceedingly prosy 

 and prosaic kind. It will, perhaps, be said, that its poetry is to 

 come, for we are told that the pediment is to be filled-in with 

 sculpture, and will have statues placed upon it as acroteria. And 

 when that shall have been done, all the rest will look poorer and 

 more insipid than it does now, and the general composition — so to 

 call it — will show of more patchwork character than ever. Hardly 

 will a sculptured pediment serve to reconcile us better than at 

 jiresent to the architectural sluttishness of letting a brick carcase 

 and sundry little excrescences that are anything but decorative or 

 dignified, come into sight along with the facade. In all the views 

 which have been published of the Museum, those offensive eyesores 

 have of course been kept out of sight; and not they alone, but 

 also what ought to have been — and what perhaps, the architect 

 himself takes, or rather took to be, sufficiently worthy features in 

 the ensemble — viz., the official residences, which even considered in 

 themselves are so exceedingly jejune in point of design, that 

 should, as is by no means unlikely, the opposite houses be in course 

 of time rebuilt with any aim at architectural display, those wing* 

 will look more insignificant than ever. 



Let it not be thought that we merely abnse, and that perhaps 

 somewhat spitefully, the fafade of the Britiuh Museum: condemn 

 it we certainly do, and most decidedly toti, but not without point- 

 ing out its serious and now irremediable defect* and short- 

 comings, which, most unluckily, ig all that can now be done, and 

 which ought to be done, in order to prevent another fine oppor- 

 tunity — though one equally fine is not likely to present itself for 

 a long time to come — from being thrown away in a similar manner. 

 And even the Museum will, all unsatisfactory as it is, be instruc- 

 tive, if we profit by the errors and mistakes there committed. 



Mr. Fergusson has said: "1 never found fanlt without satisfying 

 myself that I could do better;" and we proceed also to justify our 

 heavy censure of the fa9ade of the Museum by submitting to our 

 readers an idea of our own, which we surrender up to their criti- 

 cism. — The general line of the fayade should have been brought up 



to the street — that is, within a few feet of the foot pavement, or 

 as far as the extreme wings now are; and have been made to form 

 a nearly continuous range of building, 570 feet in extent, com- 

 posed of two wings running east and west, and leaving a space of 

 about 200 feet wide between them, where the centre of the com- 

 position would have retired about 50 feet backwarder, and would 

 have presented a magnificent Corinthian octastyle connected with 

 the wings by curved screen colonnades of the Ionic order, which 

 would have been that of the wings, exhibited in two tetrastyle 

 porticoes directly facing each other, consequently at right angles 

 to the principal one, whereby the three pediments so disposed 

 would have combined and contrasted with each other in an e(iually 

 novel and picturesque manner, and would have produced a happy 

 play of perspective. We would have given 50 feet* to the height 

 of the Corinthian columns, and made that also the entire height of 

 the secondary, or Ionic order; so that the diameter of the columns 

 in both orders would have been alike — viz., 5 feet; and the inter- 

 columns also equal througliout. Some — we might say many — per- 

 haps, will object to the associating two distinct orders together in 

 the same composition; yet, those who can tolerate an Ionic and 

 Corinthian order combined together by the latter being placed 

 over the former instead of by the side of it, or who do not feel 

 scandalised by the licentiousness of the Greeks, who made no 

 scruple of placing Ionic columns behind Doric ones, cannot pos- 

 sibly with any consistency object to the marrying together two 

 different orders; or if they require a positive precedent for it, 

 they may find one — such as it is, in the Ecolede Mediciue at Paris, 

 where a Corinthian and Ionic order — such as they are — are inter- 

 mingled with each other, yet by no means very happily, altliough 

 that piece of architecture is one of considerable reputation — the 

 Ionic columns being continued within the prostyle, notwithstand- 

 ing that they are not much above half the diameter of the Co- 

 rinthian ones which come immediately before them. Besides 

 which, not only is the prostyle itself so exceedingly shallow, that 

 it is scarcely entitled to be called one, but both character and 

 effect are greatly injured, if not destroyed, by the addition of an 

 upper story whose cornice is in continuation of that of the larger 

 order, and whose windows, disproportionably large in themselves, 

 rise considerably higher than the architrave of the Corinthian en- 

 tablature, in consequence of which, the hexastyle beneath the 

 pediment has the look of being depressed; whereas, had that upper 

 story been a low attic one, carried up only to the level of the tops 

 of the capitals of the larger order, the latter would have acquired 

 that nobleness and energy of expression which, though aimed at 

 for it, have been missed. 



Should the immediately preceding remarks be thought both an 

 ill-timed digression and valueless in themselves, we leave them to 

 be set down as impertinent without pleading for their excusation; 

 and proceed further to explain our very visionary scheme, alia^ 

 dream of what might have been. 



The treatment here suggested would, we conceive, have secured 

 for the central octastyle of the Museum an unusual degree, not 

 only of positive loftiness, but of relative loftiness also. The whole 

 would have been upon a dignified scale, the columns of the lesser 

 or Ionic order being 40 feet high, which, though about 5 feet 

 lower than those of the present facade, would have been of the 

 same diameter — somewhat less lanky of course, yet, as to height, 

 rather above than at all below the average. Into many and various 

 particulars of detail and decoration we are unable to enter, bo- 

 cause they would be scarcely understood unless exhibited in a 

 drawing, therefore must leave it to be judged whether, indepen- 

 dently of the great advantage gained by leaving space behind 

 the wingst for additional buildings, should they be required,— 

 such a general arangement, presenting a decided architectural 

 focus, with both richness of columniation, and diversity of it, and 

 with three porticoes grouped together in the manner described, 

 would not have been decidedly superior to what we have now got. 

 ■Whatever may be alleged against it. It must be ;illowed that it 

 would be stamped by consistency of design, by largeness of man- 



• Smc-Ii diineiisioas may be appreciated by comparisoD with the fullowing : — 



liiigo JoaeB* Corinthian portico at Old St. Paul's 46 feet. 



Portico ot the Assize Courts, Liverpool 46 „ 



Portico o£ the Koyal Exchange 45 „ 



Portico of the Hritisl) Museum 45 „ 



The columns of our Ionic ortler would have been 5 feet less than those of the present 

 building; yet for those of a secondary order that height would he do luconsideruble 

 on«. 



t By the portico being advanced, a spacious entrance hall would be obtained between 

 that and the main body of tlie Museum ; and beyond that, — provided the worlis bad not 

 been at the time too tar advanced to admit of such alteration being made— the principal 

 staircase might have been i)iaced,and the space now occupied by the staircase would 

 have formerl au additional gallery lighted from its north side. It may be further observed 

 that our side colonuades would have formed a communication between the three porti> 

 coei, whereas those of the present facade are in the predicament of " passages that lead 

 to Dothiug." 



