Lane. Erected in 1848, from designs by Mr. William Westmacott, for the use of Mr. Hullah's singing classes. It is in the Elizabethan style of architecture, and in the roof reminds one of the Town-hall in Belgrave. It has three entrances, from three different sides of the building-from Long Acre, in the east part in Charles Street, and in the north part in Wilson Street. The great concert hall affords accommodation for three thousand persons.

HANOVER SQUARE ROOMS,

Corner of Hanover Street: a suite of rooms in which, during the season, numerous excellent benefit concerts are given upon a large scale; in these rooms also, the concerts of the Philharmonic Society take place, which, from their excellence, have obtained a world-wide reputation, and at which professors of first-rate eminence condescend to become mere members of the orchestra, executing lhe sublime compositions of Mozart, Beethoven, and Mendelsohn, with a precision and unity of feeling, unattained elsewhere. During the winter, a ball for the benefit of the Caledonian Asylum, takes place here, the company appearing in full Highland costume, producing, by the great variety of their coloured tartans, a very gay andpleasing spectacle.

Great Russell Street, Blooms ury. This splendid national institution owes its first establishment to the will of Sir Hans Sloane, an eminent physician and naturalist of his day, who directed that on his death, his books, manu

scripts, and collections, both of art and natural history, should be offered to Parliament for £20,000. The offer was accepted at his death in 1753; and the Act (26 Geo. II.) which directed the purchase, also directed the purchase of the Harleian Library of Manuscripts; and enacted that the Cottonian Library, which had been presented to the nation, in the reign of William III., and deposited in Dean's Yard, Westminster, should, with these, form one general collection; to which at the same time Geoorge II. added a large library that had been collected by the preceding sovereigns since Henry VIII. To accommodate the national property thus accumulated, the Government raised by lottery, the sum of £100,000, of which £20,000 were devoted to purchase the above collections, and in 1754, Montague House was bought of the Earl of Halifax as a repository for the then infant establishment,--the cost of the purchase and necessary repairs and fittings being about £23,000. The British Museum was opened in the beginning of 1759.

It would be tedious to furnish a complete list of the very numerous purchases and donations, by the aid of which the institution has risen to its present grandeur. In 1772, Parliament purchased Sir William Hamilton's collection of Roman vases and curiosities. The Townley Marbles were added in 1805,-two years after which was opened the Gallery of Antiquities. Colonel Greville's minerals were purchased in 1812; the Elgin and Phigaleian Marbles came in immediately on the peace of 1815; Dr. Rurney's library was purchased in 1818, for a sum of £13,500; Sir Joseph Banks's library and herbarium were bequeathed in 1820; Egyptian Antiquities were bought from Messrs. Salt and Sams, to the amount of nearly £10,000; and in 1823, King George IV. presented the splendid and very valuable library of his father, George III., comprising upwards of seventy thousand volumes, now deposited in a fine suite of rooms in the lower story of the east wing of the new building.

Subsequent additions have annually been made at great xpense, both to the Library and Galleries; besides hich, valuable donations have been made by Mr. Payne night, Sir G. Wilkinson, &c.; in 1842, a large collecn of Marbles from Xanthus was presented by Mr. llows; and in the year 1846, a most interesting and portant addition was made by the arrival of the udrun Marbles, which have been secured to this country hrough the exertions of Sir Stratford Canning.

The building in which the library and collections were originally deposited, having proved quite insufficient for their accommodation, Sir R. Smirke was desired by the Trustees of the Museum to prepare designs for a new building more worthy of the collection and the nation. The works were commenced in 1825; and in 1828 was completed the eastern wing of a new building intended

to enclose a square. Two other sides have also been finished; and in so forward a state is the new edifice, that nearly all the contents of the old Museum have now been transferred thither. The street front is nearly completed, and when all the works now in progress shall have been finished, the British Museum will unquestionably be the grandest national establishment in the metropolis, and one of the first in Europe.

Crossing the spacious court-yard, the visitor gains admission by the principal entrance, under the portico of the South Façade, by a carved oak door, nine feet wide, and twenty-four feet high.

The Entrance Hall is of the Grecian Doric order sixty-two feet by fifty-one feet, and thirty feet high. The ceiling is trabeated (cross beamed), deeply coffered, and enriched with Greek frets, and other ornaments, painted in encaustic, in various colours, most harmoniously blended: the large gold star upon a blue ground, in the centre of each coffer, has a superb effect. The floor is laid with large squares of Portland stone, and small grey marble diamonds at their angles.

At the western extremity of the Hall is the Principal Staircase. The centre flight is seventeen feet wide, and is flanked by pedestals of grey Aberdeen granite, upon which will be placed colossal sculpture. The walls on either side of this centre flight are cased with red Aberdeen granite, highly polished. On the first landing are two beautiful vases, on pedestals, of Huddlestone stone, and the balustrades are of the same material. The walls and ceiling are painted in oil, and in encaustic colours; and the ceiling is trabeated, coffered, and decorated to harmonise with the Entrance Hall. These decorations have been executed by Messrs. Collman and Davies.

At the top of the Grand Staircase, commence the suite of Rooms appropriated to natural history, the arrangements of which are now nearly completed. These galleries occupy, on the upper floor, the eastern portion of