INTRODUCTION. 



5 



the Treasury that they were prepared to take steps for remov- Govern- 

 ing a portion of the National collections to South Kensing- ment plans * 

 ton, and the Trustees were asked to give further advice 

 in respect to this proposal. Their recommendation was that 

 the whole of the Natural History collections should be simul- 

 taneously removed, as well as also those of Ethnography. 

 Accordingly, a BUI was brought in by the Government early 

 in the session of 18 6 2, to enable the Trustees to effect 

 this removal ; but it was rejected, on the ground of the great 

 outlay required for the erection of the proposed new building 

 at South Kensington. Much public discussion ensued on this 

 defeat of the intentions of the Government ; Professor Owen Professor 

 setting forth his views in a work entitled, "On the Extent ^p h S | et 

 and Aims of a National Museum of Natural History," pub- 

 lished in the summer of 1862. In the session of 1863, the Purchase of 

 Government renewed their efforts to cope with the Museum g^hKen- 

 difficulty, and after failing to induce the House of Commons sington. 

 to sanction the purchase of the entire Exhibition buildings at 

 South Kensington, with the view to appropriating a portion 

 of them to the purposes of a Museum of Natural History, 

 succeeded in obtaining a vote for the purchase of the requisite 

 number of acres from the Exhibition ground. The prospect 

 of the immediate erection of the desired building seemed 

 now sufficiently promising, but nearly twenty years were 

 to elapse before its complete realisation. Plans for the 

 proposed Museum had already been prepared for Govern- Plan of 

 ment. In September, 1862, Mr. Hunt, of the Office ofg^ r on 

 Works, was instructed to work out the design of a building Owen's 

 suggested by Professor Owen, and this was submitted to sclieme - 

 the House of Commons in June, 1863. The proposed 

 building was to have covered about four acres of land ; 

 would have consisted of a vaulted basement, two storeys 

 above the roadway for the exhibition of the collections, 

 with an attic over a part of the centre for libraries and pro- 

 fessors' rooms, and would have included a theatre, 100 feet 

 in diameter, for lectures. The site was to be on the east 

 side of Queen's Gate, and the cost of the building was esti- 

 mated at £350,000. The land was purchased at the rate 

 of £10,000 per acre. 



