LONDON IN 1860. [From the Spectator,]

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume IX, Issue 909, 19 April 1854, Page 4

LONDON IN 1860. [From the Spectator,]

Prophetic visions of an altered state of society are very common. A book, if we remember rightly, has been written on the state of London in the year 2000. A distinguished Member of Parliament has imagined a future New Zealander surveying London, restored to the Papacy, from Westminster Bridge. Without entering into these vaticinations, we may in some respects see beyond the prophetic vision of that Member or of the imaginary New Zealander. For that purpose, we need not conjure up fanciful changes, but only look to the fact of those whose commencement is already recorded on our statutebook, or in other authentic forms set down for completion. The bridge, for instance, on which the New Zealander was to stand, is destined for removal. It Lad indeed decreed a removal for itself ; having for some years shown such determined si^n-s of vanishing, that more than one writ ne exeat has been issued, lest the Thames should convoy Westminster Bridge to the Nore without notice. Other new bridges are destined, at Battersea, and probably also at Putney, in lieu of those trap* that now serve as a man-weir for Cockney fish tbat float up and down the stream. A new park at Battersea, a new embankment with a path on the right batik of the Thames above the Metropolis, will effect a considerable change in the remo c landscape ot the upper stream ; to say nothing of the improvement in the bridge itself. Henre, should the embankment not go lower than Millbank, it will bring the ornamental portion of the Thames within the range of the Metropolis. By that time another important change will have come over the stream. The smoke which now hangs above London is in part forbidden, especially to the Thames : this year the steamers must cease disgorging their sullen contribution to the cloud. Next year the great furnaces will be added to the list of the proscribed ; and then, probably, the private bouses will begin to follow, and that before a very long time ; because the prohibition of smoking to many trading establishments will necessarily stimulate invention which is already devoted to planning arrangements for producing fire without smoke. This clearing of the atmosphere will in itself be a vast alteration to the aspectof London. The securing of translucent sky will be a great first step in securing the translucent wave below ; since the cloud of soot will be withheld from the Thames. For a time, the noisome odours of that ill-used stream, no longer emanating from atmospheric causes, will be limited to the subaqueous abuses ; but it is probable also that the supply will be cut off in this respect by improved plans of drainage, which will intercept the grand drains before they flow into the Thames, and carry down the refuse beyond the Metropolis, there to be destined to useful purposes. Plans for tbat purpose are already in existence ; they only await the proper authority; and Lord Palmerston has promised a step in tbat direction when he is to give to the Commissioner of Sewers new powers, with something in the way of representation. — a practice also introduced in regard to other local improvements. Translucent wave will then reflect translucent sky. But other improvements are already in their commencement. A bill has received the Royal assent for constructing a subterranean railway from Bayswater by Paddington to King's Cross, — an experiment which fifs in with an iiea long maintained by Mr. Charles Pearson, of a central London terminus, with branch rails to relieve that traffic ( f goods tbat now oppresses the streets of London. A widening of the streets in the City is already going on ; but with such a relief as tbat contemplated, the widened streets would be doubled, and the traffic reduced to much greater system. With a wider space, far less would be j needed in the way of horse-drawn carriages. Now the commencement of these improvements is authorized by act of Parliament. Not only will the aspect of the entire Metro-, polis be changed by these comparatively few improvements, but the manners and customs of its inhabitants will receive a corresponding change. The public buildings of London will no longer be

piles of blackness ; but if smoke be generallyprohibited, and the use of our present firing be discontinued, the human face may cease to be black as well as public buildings, and then ws shall have neither coal-heavers nor scullions nor chimney-sweepers introduced amongst us, as a most unsuccessful burlesque of Negro slavery. Indeed, with the exile of smoke the vrhole population would piobably do much more credit than it does to the daily efforts at keeping itself in a state of cleanliness. Abolish the smoke, and to a great extent you abolish the chimnies ; but what is the thing which keeps the London people above all others absent from the roofs of their houses, if it is not that detestable smoke? Abolish the smoke, and it is as certain as that certain flowers grow out of earth turned from certain mines, that flowers will flourish also on the tops of London houses ; and where the flowers grow the cultivators must appear. It is by no -means impossible that in six years the report of a Select Committee may have been converted from a recommendation into a law, and that by that time the whole of the London as well as the English people will be conducting their bargains in n decimal system of coinage : another reason, with many more, why useless prolongation ot daily labour should be somewhat contracted ; and then possibly the London clerk or the London tradesI man may sei himself to enjoy his evening in a new fashion. In the first place, he may turn off the fire, which might then be a handy application of gas, !as convenient to Kindle suddenly as it would be economical to turn it off as soon as he ceased to ! want it. He will then sally forth into the unencumbered streets, proud of the public buildings here and there, old or new ; for if London can be made handsome, buildings will inevitably multiply. He will bend his steps towards the translucent wave. Here, standing amongst the gay promenaders on the Lungo Tamigi, he will ask himself whether he shall pursue the walk by the architectural beauties that flank the river to the new Park at Bartersea ; whether he shall take the rail for the Crystal Palace at Sydenham, there to survey and contemplate nature and art in one view ? whether he shall join the gay crowd at this or that pleasant bathinghouse, to sport in the translucent wave ? whether he shall join some pleasant boating party exhibiting its skill to the loungers on the banks in the very midst of London ? or whether he shall ascend the prospect-minaret of the Panopticon in Leicester Squaie, to survey the progress of horticulture on the roof's of his beloved city, — possibly, with a hope of catching some indiscreet courtship interestingly pursued by a Romeo and Juliet of private life, where now the cata and the chimnies usurp the domain.