BUILDINGS. The greatest recent innovation in the building enterprises of London is the multi plication of very large and handsome hotels, the increasing number of theatres whieltfar surpass the old buildings in architecture and in the safety, convenience, and beauty of their interior arrange ments and fittings, and the construction of apart• went houses and flats, formerly unknown in Lon don. All parts of London are alike in the fact that most of the houses are built of brick, and all are blackened by the smoke-laden fogs, though the West End suffers least from this discomfort. There are no quarries in the neighborhood, and for this reason the ordinary houses are of brick. while the stone for the finer buildings is brought from a great distance. The buildings in 1901, in the administrative county of London. included 571,i6S inhabited and 40,069 uninhabited struc tures and 4624 in course of erection.
London has expanded principally toward the west, as the purifying winds usually blow fr.au that direction. The fashionable and wealthy live in the West End (the neighborhood of lIple Park and Kensington Gardens). and thus escape most of the smoke-laden air of the factory dis tricts. Here are the palatial residences of the aristocracy who deserted their residenees farther east in the districts now occupied by commer cial London. Just east of the old City. now the financial centre of London. and immediately in contact with it. are the poorest quarters of Lon don (the East End), where myriads live in pov erty and many in misery; here the annual death rate is from 30 to 60 for every 1000 persons. want of work and bread greatly increasing the mortality. Some of the narrow streets in the 1;ot herb it he, Bermondsey, and Lambeth districts, south of the Thames, are also the abodes of the poorer classes.
Extending far north of the old City are tens of square miles of houses of the common English type occupied by the lower middle classes, who live comfortably on modest incomes; and on the outskirts of the city to the north and east are great districts chiefly inhabited by artisans liv ing in small but neat houses. In the northwest are many more square miles with higher and larger houses, many of them architecturally pre tentious, the homes of the wealthier middle class. Thousands of these houses are luxurious homes.
The most striking edifices in the City of Lon don proper. which embraces only 673 acres, are banks. exehanges. warehouses, and offices, among which still stand a number of edifices which were the palaces of the nobility before commerce drove them farther west. During the day more than 1.000000 human beings are working within the narrow limits of the old City. At night its only inhahitants are the caretakers with their families and the police. Only 26,923 persons lived in the old City in 1901.
Two of the royal palaces, once in the heart of time fashionable quarter, are now considerably east of the aristocratic part of London. These are Saint. James's Palace (q.v.), lying directly eastward of Belgravia. the most fashionable part of London. and Buckingham Palace. isolated by the parks in front of it and the royal private gardens in the rear but within sound of the roar of commercial Victoria Street. Other notable palaces are Marlborough House (q.v.), the resi dence of the Prince of Wales; Kensington Palace, (q.v.) on the west of Kensington Gardens; Lam beth Palace (q.v.), the archiepiscopal residence of the primates of England; and Whitehall (q.v.), the ancient palace of the archbishops of York, replete with historic associations. and now used for public offices.
The Tower (q.v.) is the most venerable of the old buildings. It stands on the banks of the Thames at the southeast corner of the old City. The ancient walls, the fine building called the White Tower. Saint John's Chapel, one of the finest specimens of Norman architecture in Great Britain, and other structures of more modern date stand amid a garden and drill ground every inch of which is historic. This scene of former
crimes and suffering is now used as an arsenal and armory. and the crown jewels of the King dom are kept there. Westminster Abbey (q.v.), less ancient than the Tower, was built in the city of that name long since merged with London. In spite of additions and restorations not ap proved by the architectural taste of to-day, the :\bbey remains one of the most perfect specimens of Gothic architecture in England. Its interior is strikingly beautiful, though much crowded with monuments reared to royalty and hundreds of the great men of the country. Among the largest Gothic edifices in the world are the Houses of Parliament. standing on the banks of the Thames, with a river front of 940 feet, covering eight acres and containing more than 1000 rooms and two miles of corridors. The chief external fea tures are Saint Stephen's or the Clock Tower, 318 feet high. containing the great bell Big Ben; the Middle Tower. 300 feet high; and the Victoria Tower, 340 feet high, with its handsome and lofty royal entrance. The chief interior features are the House of Peers, the House of Commons, West minster Hall, part of the ancient Westminster Palace of the .:\nglo-Saxon kings, and the scene of numerous historical events of importance. the octagonal central hall with its noble monuments, the libraries, and the numerous courts. The dome of Saint Paul's Cathedral (q.v.) rises high above London, is visible from most parts of time city, is the first object to impress the stranger, and is the noblest of the monumental structures. Here also arc many monuments to military and naval heroes, artists, and other great men of England. The Mansion House in the Poultry, the official residence of the Lord Mayor. is an eigh teenth-century structure in a Corinthian style of architecture; the Guildhall .(q.v.), or City Council hall, dates from 1411; the Royal Courts of Justice. a magnificent block of Gothic build ings on the Strand, were opened in ltiS•. The luxurious club-houses are naturally grouped in the district where they are most accessible at once to the Parliament buildings and Government offices, the financial centre of the old City and time aristocratic West End. The clubs are situated in the district between Saint James's Park on the south. Piccadilly on the north, and Regent Street on the east. Most of the club buildings are im pressive in proportions and architecture and are classed among the ornaments of London.
The more prominent of the theatres, of which there are over thirty-six in the county district and several in the suburbs. are the Royal Italian Opera or Covent Garden Theatre, in Bow Street; Drury Lane Theatre; the Lyceum. The Strand, The Savoy, The Adelphi, and the Gaiety, all in the Strand; the Haymarket; Her Majesty's Theatre, opposite the Haymarket; The Princess, in Oxford Street: The Criterion, in Piccadilly; and Daly's Theatre, in Leicester Square. The chief of the music halls are the Alhambra and the Empire. both in Leicester Square, and the South of London Palace of Amusements, in Lon don Road, holding 5,000 persons.
The city is adorned throughout with numerous monuments, statues, and memorials of eminent personages, the more remarkable being the Albert Memorial. between Queen's and Prince's gates, Kensington Gardens, opposite Albert Hall, a mag nificent Gothic monument designed by Sir G. Scott and erected at a cost of $600.000; the Nel son Column, fountains, and other statues in Trafalgar Square; time colossal Statue of Achilles or Guard's Monmnent, at Hyde Park corner, to the Duke of Wellington; the National Memorial to Queen Victoria, in course of erection in front of Buckingham Palace; and Cleopatra's Needle, on the Thames Embankment, the companion Egyptian obelisk to the one in Central Park, New York.