SIR WILLIAM GALLWETsaid, he would beg to ask the First Commissioner of Works, Whether certain Arcades and Galleries, until lately in the possession of the Kensington Royal Horticultural Society, have or are about to become the property of the State?
MR. COWPERsaid, in reply, that the Arcades, which were to be purchased by the Government in pursuance of a Vote of the House, were the subject of a deed which was not yet finally executed. Those Arcades were the property of the persons who sold them to the public; they were never the property of the Horticultural Society, nor were they included in their lease, but were portions of the buildings of the International Exhibition Building.
§ SIR WILLIAM GALLWEYsaid, he must beg to repeat his question with reference to the buildings which were portions of the Exhibition Building of 1862.
MR. COWPERreplied that those buildings had always been intended to be purchased, and had been purchased.