8o 



NATURE 



[July 20, 191 1 



ment in 1878, in which the Commission again offered 

 to convey land and to provide 100,000?. for a Science 

 Museum to be built on a plan to be approved by the 

 Government. 



The view of the Commission is thus expressed in 

 their sixth Report (p. 44) : — 



" The proposed new building would complete the 

 group of buildings already erected by the Com- 

 mission, and these . . . would alone satisfactorily 

 realise the first conception of the illustrious Prince 

 who conceived the idea of purchasing the estate. 

 Should the Government eventually acquire also the 

 ante-garden for the extension of the Science build- 

 ing now proposed, or for other public buildings, and 

 thus connect our direct work with the Natural History 

 and the South Kensington Museums, the success of 

 the plans of the Prince Consort would be complete. 

 The national collections of Mediaeval and Recent Art 

 would have their home on the portion of the Estate 

 purchased with the funds derived from the Exhibi- 

 tion of 1851 which lies on the east of Exhibition 

 Road ; the Science collections on the portion of the 

 Estate which lies on the west of that road." 



This offer was declined by the Government in 1879 

 on the ground of the depression of trade, and that 

 the establishment of such a museum was not 

 sufficiently urgent ! 



After this the Commissioners took no further 

 action with regard to the Government until 1888. In 

 the meantime, however, thev had granted land for 

 the erection of the City and Guilds Institute and the 

 Imperial Institute. 



In a le^er of 1888 the land to the south of the 

 Imperial Institute Road, reaching to the land con- 

 veyed to the Government in 1864, was offered under 

 the old conditions, namely, " that the land shall be 

 permanently used for purposes connected with Science 

 and the Arts." This plot consisted of 4J acres, 

 valued at 200,000?. It was offered to the Government 

 for 70,000/., and the contained southern gallery 

 (already leased to the Government) for 30,000?. This 

 offer was accepted. 



In the year iqo7, in spite of the Commissioners' 

 repeated efforts, we had no Science Museum, and the 

 Commissioners had no more land to offer. 



All that remained in 1906 was given to the govern- 

 ing body of the Imperial College of Science and Tech- 

 nology, the new institution which is to bring together 

 all the colleges already built, and to be built, on land 

 presented, or sold al reduced value, by the Commis- 

 sion for scientific purposes. 



The existing buildings are the College of Science, 

 the site of which was given gratis; the City Guilds' 

 College, the site of which is rented at one shilling 

 per annum; and the new Chemical and Physical 

 Laboratories of the Imperial College, on a site" sold 

 by the Commission at less than hall its value. 



It may be said that, adding the value of these old 

 plots i" thai of the three given in 1006, the Commis- 

 sion has really endowed the now institution to the 

 extent of some 400,0.1(1/. 



But if a Science Museum was desirable before such 

 a bringing together and extension of science teaching 

 and research as the new institution affords, it is vastly 

 more important now, when advanced research in the 

 applications of science to the national industries is to 

 be fostered along now linos. The opinions of those 

 mosl competent to judge of the national importance ol 

 a Science Museum thiriv years ago can be gathered 

 from an appendix to the Commissioners' sixth Report 

 (p. 130I, in which is printed the memorial addressed 

 to the Lord President of the Council in 1876. 



Such .1 museum is vastly more important now, hut 

 its location at South Kensington, in closo contiguity 

 to the Imperial College, has become imperative. 

 NO. 2177, VOL. 87] 



In 1907, mindful of what the Commission of the 

 1851 Exhibition had attempted to do during the whole 

 time of its existence up to that time in furtherance of 

 the completion of the National Museum organisation, 

 I considered it my duty to call the attention of the 

 Commissioners to the fact that practically the whole 

 of the land belonging to them had been allocated, and 

 that, so far, no proper provision had been made for 

 a Museum doing for the Physical, Chemical, and 

 Mechanical Sciences what the British .Museum Library 

 does for books, the Galleries for Antiquities, the 

 National Gallery does for pictures, and the Natural 

 History Museum does for the Biological Sciences. 



In a memorandum to the Commissioners urging the 

 early erection of such a museum I wrote : — 



" How, then, can its early erection be brought about? 

 I submit by holding out a special inducement to the 

 Government to utilise in this direction some part of 

 the land sold to the Government in 1888 still waste 

 between the old and new buildings of the College 

 of Science and adjacent thereto. 



"The importance of the eastern part of this site 

 for the purpose I have indicated has long been recog- 

 nised. In 1891 it was ignorantly offered by the 

 Government to Mr. Tate for an art gallery, but 

 when the facts had been inquired into, the offer was 

 withdrawn by the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, 

 Mr. Goschen. Both in a memorial presented to Lord 

 Salisbury and by a deputation to the Lord President 

 of the Council and the Chancellor of the Exchequer 

 it was pointed out that were the corner site in ques- 

 tion not occupied by the science collections the 

 teaching in the Royal College of Science would be 

 cut in two when the new laboratories were erected 

 (they have been erected since). On this ground the 

 Government withdrew the offer to Mr. Tate, and 

 reserved the site for future science buildings. 1 



"The frontage of this plot, which indeed is the last 

 important and considerable frontage remaining, is in 

 Exhibition Road, stretching from the Natural History 

 Museum grounds to the Imperial Institute Road. It 

 lies exactly between the old and new Royal College 

 of Science buildings. 



" 1 may add that the frontage available in Exhibition 

 Road is over 360 feet ; that is, 60 feet longer than the 

 west frontage of the Victoria and Albert Museunl 

 and only 17 feet shorter than the frontage of the 

 now buildings of the British Museum. . . . 



"Were this building erected, all the ground once 

 possessed by the Commissioners along Cromwell 

 Road and to the south end of Exhibition Road would 

 have been utilised for the purposes of Science and Art. 

 Art on the east side, and Science on the west side of 

 Exhibition R.iad, as was originally planned. 



"Were the southern galleries — the old Exhibi- 

 tion refreshment rooms — taken down, and the danger- 

 ous spirit museum removed to a safer site, such as the 

 Natural History Museum Gardens, some distance 

 west of the main building, there would be a space 

 of more than four acres between the Natural History 

 Musi urn and the Chemical and Physical Laboratories, 

 and stretching from Exhibition Road to Queen* 

 Gate, not only with the frontage to which I have re- 

 ferred, but another in Queen's Gate. Here, indeed, 

 it would be possible, as a variant of the plan I have 

 suggested, to erect a Science Museum similar to the 

 one offered by the Commissioners to the Government 

 in r878, and indicated on their plan. Much of this 

 land is not at present permanently occupied, and the 

 Solar Physics Observatory is under notice to quit, a 

 now- site at Caterham having already been fixed upon. 

 " 1 1 seems desirable that this long-standing questiol 

 of .1 Science Museum should be again discussed, and 



1 Accounts of what took place will be found in Natcke, February. i3os 

 and March, 1S92, vols, xliii. and xlv. 



