CHARING CROSS BRIDGE.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR."'
Sra,—In three essentially excellent paragraphs in the " News of the Week " of September 2nd you speak of the Charing Cross Bridge. You anticipate criticism, and accepting the courteous opening, may I venture to suggest that you perhaps err in at least two points, one of commission, the other of omission ? That the bridge should be monumental and Imperial in being, all except the Little Englander will agree; also, and here you touch the true note, in insisting that the statuary embellishment of the bridge should not be by portrait or individual figures, but by types; embodying the various branches of ser- vice and war-work, of the very soul and spirit of the people and Empire. In all past great periods of sustained national sacrifice and exaltation, great art co-ordinated and formulated, naturally and in the vernacular, the national culture and achievement. Consequently the architecture of any great spiritual age as expressed by its monuments, if it be true to itself, must be neither pretentiously archaeological nor pedantically archaic ; both affectations being alike retrograde and decadent, and neither vibrating with the spirit of an imaginative age. Art must over be and express the living spirit of a living age. Whether the national spirit is to-day best and most directly expressed by architectural or engineering achievement may be an arguable point ; but in the times of the giants of art these two were as one. It matters little by what name we call a thing ; what is essential is that it be itself great. May I suggest that your first, may I say error of commission, is embodied in the pronouncement that " where the bridge leaves the shore should stand triumphal arches " ? On very many mediaeval bridges there are, or were, fortified gateways with arches. These, for purposes of defence, were placed " where the bridge leaves the shore " ; and, because these mediaeval bridges were very narrow, the height and mass of the gateway did not greatly detract from the bridge's apparent length. The new Charing Cross Bridge will, however, and of necessity, be a very wide and flat bridge ; consequently the erection of gsp.t monumental arches at either end will detract calamitously from apparent length, and moreover dominate unduly the whole monument. The true place for such triumphal arches is not on the actual bridge itself, but following the axial line of the bridge, on the outer side of its great approach courts, which might be something suggesting at least in plan, if in modified form, the Piazza di S. Pietro of Rome. One assumes that there will be an open space at either approach, and at the entrance to these, and on the axial line of the bridge, is surely to be found the site for the proposed triumphal arches. These great courts, each dedicated re- spectively to the Navy and Army, would also be, for many obvious as well as aesthetic reasons, the place for the typical statuary and inscribed panels, each with its appropriate architectural background, rather than, as you suggest, on the parapet of the bridge itself ; where, showing directly against the sky, the statuary could neither be fittingly seen, nor yet readily have a suitable statuary background. Such a court at either end of the bridge, with its great archway axially not only with the bridge, but also if possible with its main artery of traffic, would,
also permit of the statuary following the architectural line of the court, and so becoming an integral and fitting part of its general design. More- over, each court would then be a visible and real part and continuation of the bridge, and so not only add to its roadway length, but also to its architectural importance and monumental dignity. To punctuate and emphasize the beginning of the bridge proper, its shore terminals might be embellished with appropriate war obelisks.
. The dominating line of a bridge is the horizontal, and not the vortical ; bad a series of aggressive points upon a dominating horizontal line detracts inevitably from its restfulness and dignity. One has only to recall Beruini's statues on the bridge of S. Angelo to see how very un- desirable a series of statues on the parapet of a bridge can be, and in Roman architecture it marked its utter decadence. Of course, in any old city with fixed and dominating lines of traffic, the plan, design, and actual position of the triumphal arches, as of the whole bridge approaches, must be studied in detail ; but no great or insuperable difficulty need arise, if only the scheme be treated in an Imperial, and not in a parochial, spirit.
Again, Sir, the question of the number of arches is purely one of relative scale and design ; and to make the centre arch of any con- siderably greater span and height than the others would be surely an aesthetic mistake, and introduce gratuitously unnecessary difficulties by materially altering the dominating curve of the arch, both in its spring and crown.
Westminster is the great individual temple of the nation. Why should not the bridge bearing the name of Queen Eleanor's cross be the great monument of the Empire ? May I recall the spirit in which the rulers of Florence approached the building of their Cathedral f " The Floren- • tine Republic, soaring above the conception of the most competent judges, desires that an edifice should be constructed, so magnificent in its height and beauty that it shall surpass everything of the kind produced in the time of their greatest power by the Greeks and Romans." Florence was then entering upon the most brilliant period of her career.
Is the British Empire to-day less great than was the Florentine Republic, or her rulers less noble ? What is to be the progeny of the awful travail of to-day ? Is art to be the only thing that is not to rise in the majesty of Empire, and the glory of her sons ; and is she to fail because of herself, or because of parsimony or the lack of the Imperial spirit in her rulers ? These are questions to be fitly asked and answered.
Your suggestion, Sir, of triumphal arches, statues, and inscribed panels, dedicated not to individuals but to types, breathes true demo- cratic Imperialism. It is the whole Empire that is winning this war; a war which is, above all, a soldiers' continuing battle. Among these you mention, I think, eleven types of the serving man ; and therein lies what may be the point of your omission; else why, in the name of fair- ness and good feeling, leave out the Army Service Corps ? A great general once said that an army moves on its stomach. Well, the Army Service Corps is that stomach, and of it the Motor Transport Section, at least, shares to the full the danger and the glory of all the other service units. True, it gets all the abuse that is going, but why carry that spirit into monumental art ? And however small its relative share and sphere may have been in the wars of the past, in the war of to-day it has come into its own, and will indubitably be raised to rank with the other " Royal " branches of the service ; perhaps oven before tho termination of the war.—I am, Sir, &c., Jesus A. Mortars.
Wellington Chambers, Ayr, N.B. • [We agree as to the entrances to the approach courts being the proper places for the triumphal arches. We apologize to the Army Service Corps, as gallant a corps as any in the Army, for forgetting them, and we must make a similar apology to the airmen.—En. Spectator.]
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