Page:All the Year Round - Series 2 - Volume 1.djvu/236

 . One of the houses spared the contractors some trouble, by rattling down, of its own accord, one day, into the Strand: where it lay with all its lots merged into a dusty heap of ruin. The advertisement contractors and bill posters took possession of the hoarding, and that part of the Strand is still bright with the garish colours and violent contrasts dear to the advertising heart. A perfect gallery of sensation pictures has taken the place of the magic donkeys in the affections of the loafing public. In particular one gorgeous work has just been hung, so to speak, and by a curious coincidence in the spot erst hallowed by the presence of those eccentric animals, which is worthy of all praise. A most astounding steeple-chase is coming off amidst the cheers of an excited multitude. A prodigious field of horses is undergoing every kind of sporting disaster, possible and impossible, across a country of unparalleled stiffness; and the jockeys (who seem not to have learnt the rudiments of their art), are to be seen everywhere but in their saddles. One jockey, just emerging dripping from a ditch, careless of the flight of his steed, is pointing out the beauties of the scene to the spectators, with modest pride.

The miserable rookeries were speedily dismantled, and their occupants were driven into the already overcrowded neighbourhood of Drury-lane, Short's-gardens, Charles-street and the like. This is one of our grand circumlocutional principles, which is always to unhouse the wretched when room is wanted, and to take no kind of thought of housing them again. One side of Clement's-inn was removed, and the chambers on the east side were pulled down. Carey-street and Bell-yard each lost one side, and soon the area was almost clear. Some few houses still remain; among them, the mysterious house in the square, the centre of a few other crumbling ruins. Close to Clement's-inn still linger a few buildings, doomed but not yet destroyed: a miserable sight. Some are roofless and gutted; some are sections of houses, half pulled down, with dirty paper still fluttering from the walls. Others, with which the difficulty appears to be to keep them standing until their time comes, are supported by strong timbers, over which their rotten sides bulge in a suggestive and alarming fashion. And yet, even here, in the heart of this desolation, a ricketty public-house still keeps open; some few houses not so far gone as others, are still inhabited. An enthusiastic and enterprising marine store dealer still exposes his stock of a bundle of rags, half a dozen locks, a pair of scales, and a mass of rusty metal. Privileged and secure the little barber's shop at Temple-bar still holds its own, and remains untouched.

The speculative nature of the evidence on which the commissioners had formed their financial estimate speedily became apparent. As is not unusually the case under similar circumstances, property on that particular spot was found to be remarkable for its increasing value, and leases (granted in some cases at dates curiously coincident with the first suggestion of the Carey-street site), were discovered to have risen surprisingly in value during the seven years that had passed over the heads of the fortunate lessees. Commercial enterprise must have been having a "good time of it" north of the Strand and south of Carey-street. Everybody must have been doing a roaring trade, and the roaring of the trade seemed to have all come into being in that particular seven years. The commissioners, as we have seen, expressed themselves satisfied that they could buy the site and build their law courts, at the comparatively modest outlay of a million and a half. The confiding nature of committees and the ingenuousness of witnesses have rarely been displayed to better advantage than on this particular occasion. The sums paid for the site, up to the present moment, very nearly reach a total of eight hundred thousand pounds; and the commissioners now represent this to be insufficient, and have recommended an application to parliament for an additional grant of seven hundred thousand pounds! The buildings will, doubtless, more than double the pleasant, but fallacious estimate by which the commissioners were induced to give the certificate required by the Act of 1865. It is by no means surprising, one would say, that the question of the new Law Courts should be once more attracting a great deal of public attention.

The commissioners clearly made a terrible mistake in their calculations, but as that sort of thing is not altogether unknown in the history of committees, there is nothing to be done but to grin and bear it. New Law Courts in a good position, we must have. If we have to pay three millions instead of the smaller sum which we had fondly hoped would be all that would be required of us, we shall have to find the money with as good a grace as possible. But now that the question is once more presented to us, there is one thing we can do, and that is, to take the utmost possible pains to find out in what manner we may get the best value for our expenditure. At present it is not possible to deal with the question of the buildings. The first thing to see about is the spot where the buildings are to stand; when that is satisfactorily settled, then will come the time of the architects and art critics.

Now, what are the special advantages of the site that has been acquired, and are they such as to satisfy the public that they have got the best and most convenient site, not merely for the legal profession, but for themselves as well?

It would almost seem that the commissioners of 1858 must have been influenced in their preference of the selected position to the others proposed at the same time, simply by the fact of the positive disadvantages attaching to its rivals being greater than the manifest objections to itself. For, it must surely be admitted, that considered by itself, and not as deriving an illusory and factitious excellence from being contrasted with the shortcomings of other places,