We have given at length Mr. Tite's own description of the building, as affording the most perfect and complete expla nation of every particular connected with it, and also as showing the many requirements he had to meet, and the various interests he had to provide for. It is due to him to say, that he has certainly succeeded in satisfying all parties, in the convenience of his arrangements for individual benefit, while he has added to the public buildings of London an edifice in every respect worthy the first community in the world. On one part of the design much discussion took place at the time, viz., whether the area of the new Exchange should or should not be an open court, as in the old building. In the instructions issued to the competing architects by the Gresham Committee, this was insisted on, and, as we are informed, in compliance with the general opinion of the merchants and bankers of London. With submission, how ever, we are strongly inclined to believe that the merchants and the Gresham Committee might have left this matter, with benefit, to the discretion of the architects offering designs, with whom it would have remained to demonstrate the advantage or defects of either mode of construction, whether open or covered.
It is worthy of remark that the Bourse at Paris, and at St Petersburg, the Exchanges of Dublin and Glasgow-, and almost all modern structures erected for a similar purpose, are, we believe, roofed in ; one advantage of which is, that the whole of the area is available, let the weather be as unfavourable as it may. consequently, the same superficial extent can accommodate a far greater number of persons than where it is only partially sheltered, and where a considerable portion must frequently he altogether useless. as fl- as actual serviceableness is concerned. The present arrangement is to he approved of only where what is this sacrificed, with regard to mere convenience and utility, is amply ato•(' for by m hat is gained as to architectural character and efil.et.
We do not deny that a rortite, surrounded by eldionns or by arches, and whether partially or entirely so. is favourable to scenic effi et and display, and, farther. admits of very great variety as to plan mid design. This is suffi ciently testified by examples in Italian buildings, where cortiles frequently constitute the most striking and beautiful parts, generally picturesque and piquant, though not always unexceptionable in design. But then it does not exactly follow that because a cortile is beautiful as such, it is eligible for a purpose requiring more than a sheltered corridor around the open part ; for, although that kin] of shelter is sufficient for a place of pussaqe to and fro, it certainly does not seem to be sufficient for one intended for the assemblage of a con course of persons, not on particular occasions, when, in case of the weather proving unfavourable, the company may be protected from it by awnings provided for the emergency, but daily, throughout all seasons of the year. When a
place of the kind already exists, it may conveniently and properly enough be applied just as it is to the purpose of an Exchange ; its ineonvenienee may, then, be put up with as unavoidable. But there is no qualifying c'ircumstanc'e, to reconcile us to a defect studiously adopted. voluntarily and with premeditation, to the exclusion not only of positive convenience. Lilt likewise of originality of design. Either our climate is most unjustly reproached, not only by ireigne•s, but by ourselves, or it ought at once to have banished all idea of rebuilding the Royal Exchange upon the plan of the former one, as regards that very principal part of it where the merchants will daily assemble, and to which all the rest is to be considered as merely supplementary.
Be it any improvement or not, all our lately built markets are floored with flagstone pavements, and covered in from the weather. shaded from the burning sun in summer, as well as sheltered from rain and snow in winter ; nor do we believe that either the occupiers of them, or their customers, at all regret the change which has taken place. Nevertheless, with instances of that kind before their eyes, not in the Metropolis alone, but at Liverpool, Newcastle, and other places, the merchants of London have decided that they are to meet for business as heretofore, within an area only partially and imperfectly protected from the weather. Even beneath the colonnades, they must be more or less exposed to wind and rain, and be inconvenienced by the throng of persons ; whereas, by converting the central space into the part more particularly appropriated to the transaction of business. the sides, which might still be separated from it by colonnades, would be left free for persons passing in or out, without interruption to those engaged in business.
There may possibly be contrary reasons for not adopt ing a mode of building securing the advantages here pointed out by us ; but they have not peen brought fiwward by others, nor can we divine what they can be. thirdly can it be objected, that any plan of the kind would destroy all peculiarity of character, by converting the Exchange itself into merely a spacious hall, lighted from above, which, how ever it might be decorated, would, in its general effect, resemble any other public apartment of the same dimensions; because, although it would no longer be a cortile—an open space enclosed by facades of external architecture—it might lie kept altogether different from anything we are accustomed to, in interior architecture, and appropriately rendered sui oeneris, It will appear a very singular pendent to the above obser vations, that we should have to insert the following petition to the Gresham Committee, from the very parties to oblige when[ " uncovered" area was insisted on.