Bow, Stratford, Shadwell, Limehouse, Wapping, and
St. George's-in-the-East. Without doubt the real centre, the [Greek:
omphalos] of dreariness, is situated somewhere in the Mile End Road,
and it is to be hoped that the Palace may be placed upon the very
centre itself.

Let me say a few words as to what this Palace may and may not do. In
the first place, it can do nothing, absolutely nothing, to relieve the
great starvation and misery which lies all about London, but more
especially at the East-end. People who are out of work and starving do
not want amusement, not even of the highest kind; still less do they
want University extension. Therefore, as regards the Palace, let us
forget for a while the miserable condition of the very poor who live
in East London; we are concerned only with the well fed, those who are
in steady work, the respectable artisans and _petits commis_, the
artists in the hundred little industries which are carried on in the
East-end; those, in fact, who have already acquired some power of
enjoyment because they are separated by a sensible distance from their
hand-to-mouth brothers and sisters, and are pretty certain to-day that
they will have enough to eat to-morrow. It is for these, and such as
these, that the Palace will be established. It is to contain: (1)
class-rooms, where all kinds of study can be carried on; (2) concert
rooms; (3) conversation-rooms; (4) a gymnasium; (5) a library; and
lastly, a winter garden. In other words, it is to be an institution
which will recognise the fact, that for some of those who have to work
all day at, perhaps, uncongenial and tedious labour, the best form of
recreation may be study and intellectual effort; while for
others--that is to say, for the great majority--music, reading,
tobacco, and rest will be desired. Let us be under no illusions as to
the supposed thirst for knowledge. Those who desire to learn are even
in youth always a minority. How many men do we know, among our own
friends, who have ever set themselves to learn anything since they
left school? It is a great mistake to suppose that the working man,
any more than the merchant-man or the clerk-man, or the tradesman, is
ardently desirous of learning. But there will always be n few; and
especially there are the young who would fain, if they could, make a
ladder of learning, and so, as has ever been the goodly and godly
custom in this realm of England, mount unto higher things. The Palace
of the P