International studio (24.1904/1905(1905))

Book Reviews

Old Time Aldwych, Kingsway, and Neighbor-
hood. By Charles Gordon. 8vo. Pages
367. Illustrated. New York: E. P. Dutton
& Co. $3.00 net.
We had the pleasure of reviewing in these pages,
a little over a year ago, an excellent volume by
Charles Mulford Robinson, entitled “Modern
Civic Art, or, The City Made Beautiful,” in which
the author discussed the possibility of fostering the
artistic element in the development of the modern
city. Written from the American point of view
and with the interest of American readers mainly
at heart, those who took pleasure in it will find a
fitting companion in “Old Time Aldwych,” cover-
ing, incidentally, much the same subject, in general,
but written mainly for English readers and from
the English point of view. The book is a very
exhaustive body of records, fully illustrated, and
put out in adequate style. The author opens as
follows:
“The vast City of London has laboured under
the very great disadvantage of having been built
without a plan. There was once a chance of
improvement in this matter, after the great fire of
1666 (yet that would only have applied to the city
proper); but vested interests would have been
utterly set at nought, and so Wren’s magnifi-
cent plan for a New London came to nothing and,
practically, it was rebuilt on the old lines.
“The limits of the city are well defined, but
there was an ever-growing London which never
tires of its expansion, which has swallowed up the
neighbouring City of Westminster and every out-
lying village and hamlet for many miles round, and
which is still crying out for more land to satisfy its
voracious appetite. This extension also has been
carried out on no definite plan, and streets and
roads have had their features determined by local
conditions, such as the limits of private property,
of parish boundaries, and the local configuration
of land, an instance of which I may point to in
Marylebone Lane, which follows the tortuous
course of the Tyburn. No human prescience
could foretell the future needs of this marvellous
growth, and no allowance was ever made for it.
Yet in course of time the larger thoroughfares were
congested by the traffic and something had to be
done. We burrowed under ground and made rail-
ways, but our streets are as crowded as ever; and,
as time goes on, will present a problem which must
be solved, and which can only be done by widening
the streets, at a cost which will be stupendous, for
every old house taken down is replaced with a
substantial building, generally of some architec-

tural pretensions, of a value many times more than
the edifice it has superseded.
“It stands to reason that these improvements,
urgent as they may be, must necessarily be a work
of much time, as it is not only a question of cost,
but there is a conflict of diverse authorities to be
considered.”
For the task of renovation, and adaptation to
modern requirements, of such a section of an his-
toric city, only those thoroughly familiar with its
traditions and its growth are properly equipped.
The popular disregard in the United States of such
few historic monuments a.s America can muster
is to be greatly deplored, and if this volume in-
fuses into the minds of its readers on this side a
veneration for the material evidences of their na-
tional history in stock and stone and ancient pile,
it will have done no small service to its public.
Among English Inns. By Josephine Tozier.
i2mo. Pages 23?. Illustrated. Boston: L. C.
Page & Co.
Messrs. L. C. Page’s pleasant library of books
of topography, aptly termed “The Little Pil-
grimage Series,” has just included a flattering
proof of American delight in English rural life and
characteristics. It is proverbial that a “foreigner”
very quickly becomes more thoroughly familiar
with the chief objective points in the map of a
country’s traditional land-marks than the natives
themselves, and the interest of Miss Tozier’s book
will not be confined to this side of the Atlantic.
The author’s preface in itself will form an in-
valuable general guide to all Americans who intend
travelling about England, especially those who
venture out of the beaten tracks of tourists. Here
is someone who can observe the difference of the
native point of view from her own, without getting
ruffled, or disparaging the former either directly or
by sarcastic innuendo. This is the point of view of
the traveller who endears himself to the native; the
only one that gives the traveller the right to expect
the kindly privileges of “the stranger within our
gates.”
Miss Tozier’s English travels, as revealed to her
readers in the present delightful book (may it
speedily have a companion volume on Scotland or
Ireland from the same pen!) comprise the following
attractive spots: The Queen’s Arms, Selborne,
Hampshire; “The Three Crowns,” Chagford,
Devon; Clovelly; Clerk’s Hill Farm, Evesham;
Peacock Inn, Rowsley; Hardwick Inn; The
Dukeries; The Peacock and Royal, Boston; The
Maid’s Head, Norwich; Angel Inn, Acle Bridge.

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