FURTHER ENCLOSURE OF THE REGENTS PARK.
THE appointment of the Committee of Public Walks, and their Report, recommending the formation of places of public recreation in various parts of the suburbs, and particularly the throwing open of the Regent's Park, will prove, we fear, but " a tub to the whale," judging from appearances. The Regent's Park, which is Crown land, is gradually encroached upon by private dwellings,
until there will remain no part of it • sufficiently spacious 'to be worth throwing open to the public at large. Since the erection of
the Marquis of HERTFORD'S villa, of which he appears to be tired by this time, another mansion has raised its head on a plot of ground adjoining. The gardens of the Zoological Society, now extending on every side, nearly reach to the arders of the plea- sure-grounds of this new house; and, on the other hand, the pri- vate enclosure of the inhabitants of the range of houses on the south-west side of the Park, joins the grounds of the Marquis of
HERTFORD. Thus one half of the circumference of the Park is enclosed already. Then there are the pleasure-grounds of the villas in the centre of the Park; and now an archery club is al- lowed to " carve a montrous cantle out" of the remainder. The barn-looking building, with a red-tiled roof, close to the bridge over the canal, is to be the meeting-room of a Toxopholite society; and the ground is now planting for a shrubbery and walks, as well as a lawn for butts. Perhaps the fashionable club of cricketers, or pigeon-shooters, may take a faney to the plot adjoining. Verily John Bull is the most patient of oxen. He scarcely utters a low, though he sees his pasture vanishing; and, provided he is crammed well with oil-cake and beet-root, he will toil year after year with the yoke on his neck, and stand tied up to his manger as peace- ably as if he never had ranged the flowery mead in freedom. His pocket is the only vulnerable point of an Englishman ; and that has been so often pricked by the state lancet of Sangrado Chancellors of the Exchequer, that it has become a sore place only by constant scarification, and the poverty of the blood that follows the phlebotomizing process. It is bad enough to see a place of recreation enclosed with a barrier of smoke and brick and mortar, for the convenience of those who have carriages to convey them out of town every day, and who, if they have not country-seats to retire to, during the season that is unfashionable for town, can afford to indulge them- selves with a trip to the sea-side or a Continental tour every year. But, to have the space within appropriated to pleasure-grounds for a still wealthier class, who affect to despise all that is advanta-
geous in the rus in urbe residences that they occupy, is a mon-
strous perversion of the pretended object of the laying out of this Park. It would really seem as if the Park were contrived merely as a prospect for the inhabitants of the surrounding buildings ; or to be kept, like the garden in a square, for the exclusive conve- nience of the tenants of the houses round it. The wide road that traverses the east side of the Park, in a line with Portland Place, has a very ominous look.. It is certainly intended to save the fashionable visitors of the Zoological Gardens a few ards of ground in the approach to them. If this be the case, and this road be thrown open for carriages, John Bull may bid good-bye to his pastoral visions of a ramble in the fields of the Regent's Park, with his wife and children, on a Sunday ; and bless himself that the selfish aristocracy of wealth—which, compared to that of blood, is as a swindler to a highwayman—has left him a few square yards of turf within sound of their carriage-wheels, where he may inhale the dust to as great advantage as if he were in the drive of Hyde Park. HENRY the Eighth made Church Reform the pretext for rob- bing the monks, the trustees of the poor, of their broad lands, to bestow upon his parasites. Will a Whig Ministry make up.for any lack of disposable places and pensions, by bestowing upon a favoured few a patch of pasture out of the public common field? For whom is that mansion erecting? Who, we ask, are the leading mem- bers of this archery club? In another season, this now fashion- able amusement will be out of date; and then some hanger-on will get the lease of the ground for a kitchen-garden, and the flirting-room for the knights and damsels of the long bow will be turned into a snug dwelling.
Our attention has been called to this subject by a letter from one of the dwellers in the Park, whose eye is annoyed by the red- tiled roof of the new building. He quite forgets—or rather never thinks of—the people being robbed of their play-ground. The Birmingham folks, we see, are setting on foot a plan for a public walk for the mechanics. Whatever the motive may be, we hail the improvement. The King, we have heard, suggested that the open space at Charing Cross should be appropriated as a tea • garden. We honour his want of taste. Let the people only ask him for the Regent's Park, as a fiee gift to the nation ; and if our frank, well-meaning Sovereign, dces not grant it without hesita- tion, he is not the man the People take him for.
Previous page
