A meeting attended by a very large number of influential
people in the world of art and letters was held at the Royal Academy on Monday to consider the memorial to the London County Council supporting the scheme of the Further Strand Improvement Committee. This, it will be remembered, advocates the setting back of the crescent between .Aldwych and the Strand, and facing the church of St. Mary, with a view to securing a direct roadway connecting the West End with the City, instead of a ser- pentine course which spoils the view, hampers the traffic, and destroys the effect of the Gladstone monument. On the following day the memorial was presented by Mr. Allen, M.P., immediately before the discussion of the new scheme for letting the central block of the crescent site. The memorial having been referred to the Improvements Committee, the London County Council adopted the new scheme under which the site is to be let to a syndicate on a ninety-nine years' lease at a rental of £55,000 a year for the erection of buildings for a permanent art exhibition, a theatre, a concert-ball, restaurant, and a hundred and seventy-six shops, the sum of £500,000 being fixed as minimum expenditure on the buildings. In view of the assurance received by the Further Strand Improvement Committee that their resolution will receive the very earnest attention of the Improvements Com- mittee, it is to be hoped that some modification of the agree- ment with the spidicate may be arrived at. We quite under- stand the anxiety of the Council not to increase the burden of the rates, but surely this is an occasion where aesthetic considerations may prevail. Should they feel able to accede to the request of the memorialists, all London will have cause to rejoice.
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