public places of London which is
not

A fixed figure for the time of scorn
To point his slow unmoving finger at.

London does not lack statues of men of letters. There are statues of
Burns and John Stuart Mill on the Thames Embankment, of Byron in
Hamilton Place, and of Carlyle on Chelsea Embankment. But all convey
an impression of insignificance, and thereby fail to satisfy the
nation's commemorative instinct.

The taste of the British nation needs rigorous control when it seeks
to pay tribute to benefactors by means of sculptured monuments. During
the last forty years a vast addition has been made throughout Great
Britain--with most depressing effect--to the number of sculptured
memorials in the open air. The people has certainly shown far too
enthusiastic and too inconsiderate a liberality in commemorating by
means of sculptured monuments the virtues of Prince Albert and the
noble character and career of the late Queen Victoria. The deduction
to be drawn from the numberless statues of Queen Victoria and her
consort is not exhilarating. British taste never showed itself to
worse effect. The general impression produced by the most ambitious of
all these memorials, the Albert Memorial in Kensington Gardens, is
especially deplorable. The gilt figure of the Prince seems to defy
every principle that fine art should respect. The endeavour to produce
imposing effect by dint of hugeness is, in all but inspired hands,
certain to issue in ugliness.

It would, however, be a mistake to take too gloomy a view of the
situation. The prospect may easily be painted in too dismal colours.
It is a commonplace with foreign historians of art to assert that
English sculpture ceased to flourish when the building of the old
Gothic cathedrals came to an end. But Stevens's monument of the Duke
of Wellington in St Paul's Cathedral, despite the imperfect execution
of the sculptor's design, shows that the monumental art of England has
proved itself, at a recent date, capable of realising a great
commemorative conception. There are signs, too, that at least three
living sculptors might in favourable conditions prove worthy
competitors of Stevens. At least one literary memorial in the British
Isles, the Scott monument in Edinburgh, which cost no more than
L16,000, satisfies a nation's commemorative aspiration. There the
natural environment and an architectural setting of impressive design
reinforce the effect of sculpture. The whole