§ MR. BARTLEY (Islington, N.)I beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he will state the names of the different persons, public bodies, and institutions, which have sent protests to the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851 against the proposed sale of part of the inner gardens of their estate at Kensington Gore for private buildings?
§ SIR L. PLAYFAIR (Leeds, S.)I wish also to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether he is aware that a deputation of the Mayors of nearly all the largest towns in England and Wales have waited on the Commissioners to urge that their property in South Kensington shall be sold and realized for the benefit of Provincial Museums?
§ MR. MATTHEWSI am informed by the Secretary that five memorials have been received in reference to the building plan of the Commissioners, which are all in the same form, and have been signed on behalf of the Metropolitan Public Gardens Association, the Corporation, Cutlers' Company, Chamber of Commerce, and School of Art of Sheffield, by the Mayors of Birmingham, Burslem, Hanley, Longton, Newcastle-under-Lyme, Stoke-upon-Trent, and Worcester, the Chairman of the Fenton Local Board, the Chief Bailiff of Tunstall, the Presidents of the North Staffordshire and Worcester Chambers of Commerce, and by three manufacturing firms in the Provinces. I understand that no objection to the new building plan has been addressed to the Commissioners by any of the Governing Bodies of the public institutions at present standing on the estate; and, moreover, that in considering the details of the plan great care was taken to avoid any injury to the interests of those institutions. The fact mentioned 1103 by the right hon. Gentleman opposite is, I believe, correct—namely, that a deputation of the Mayors of nearly all the largest towns in England and Wales waited on the Commissioners to urge that the property should be sold.