In Tower-street are two or three sets of offices, lofty brick buildings, which deserve passing record: one opposite Love-lane, by Mr. J. Young, in which coloured brick and stone are employed with considerable skill; another near Tower Hill, consisting of three houses, in which a good effect is produced by making the central house higher than the others, breaking the sky-line picturesquely, and placing balconies to some of the windows as an inherent part of the composition of this the architect was Mr. T. C. Clarke. In the same way a range of shops, with four floors of offices above, near King-street, Cheapside, is noticeable for an attempt on the part of the architect, Mr. F. Warren, to show that a certain amount of effect may be obtained by the use of economical materials, with very sparing ornament judiciously introduced, and the effort is to a great extent successful.

One of the most remarkable recent buildings in the City for its size and constructive features occupies the site of the well-known Swan-with-two-Necks, in Gresham-street. It is built for Messrs. Chaplin and Horne, the railway carriers, and has a frontage of nearly 100 feet, a depth of 150 feet, and a height of 64 feet above the pavement, while beneath are warehouses and extensive stabling. The front has a solid architectural character, in keeping with the purposes to which the building is to be applied. The ground floor, of Portland stone, rusticated, rests on a granite basement, while the three upper stories are of brick with stone dressings, a massive cornice crowning the whole. The architect was Mr. W. Tite, M.P.; the cost has been little under 40,000l. In the same neighbourhood many other buildings of a superior character are in progress, or recently completed. Of the latter may be mentioned the very large and handsome warehouse of Messrs. Courtauld, in Aldermanbury, designed by Mr. E. Woodthorpe; of the former, the warehouses of Messrs. Vyse, in Wood-street, designed by Messrs. Tillott and Chamberlain, and another adjoining, at the corner of Silver-street, designed by Mr. J. Murray: all of these have the ground-floor of Portland stone and the upper stories of brick with cement dressings. Adjoining the South Sea House a large building has been erected, from the designs of Messrs. Nelson and Innes, termed the South Sea Chambers, a portion of it serving as the offices of the Oriental Bank; and close by, in Threadneedle-street, another spacious pile, the ground-floor of Portland stone, the upper stories of dark red brick with stone facings, from the designs of Mr. A. Gwilt. In Broad-street an exceedingly ornate stone structure is constructing, apparently for an insurance office; and at the corner of Gracechurchstreet and Eastcheap Mr. R. Kerr is erecting a costly building for the Provident Assurance Society.

Proceeding westward, we notice in Salisbury-square the new Church Mission House, designed by Mr. E. L. Bracebridge. The façade is singularly quiet and chaste for these times of somewhat exuberant ornamentation; but its quiet dignity is suitable to the purpose for which it is designed, and the interior is said to be very complete and convenient in its arrangements. A little further west we come upon the alterations in progress by the Temple Church. Here the old houses which formerly shut in the church on the north

have been removed, and at a little distance a showy suite of chambers is in course of erection. The improvements going on here are very great; it may, we suppose, be taken for granted that they will be completed by a judicious restoration of the exposed part of the noble old church.

At the West End proper some few offices and shops of an architectural character have been erected; but the bulk of the new buildings belong to other divisions of our subject, and we cannot dwell longer on this section.

A distinctive feature in the civic architecture of our day seems likely to be the enormous hotels which are fast springing up, usually, though not always, in immediate contiguity to a railway station. We last year spoke of the Westminster Hotel at the commencement of Victoria-street. In an architectural point of view that is altogether thrown into the shade by the as yet unfinished Grosvenor Hotel, at the other end of the same street, adjoining the Pimlico railway terminus. Of this remarkable structure a better notion will be gained from the wooacut than from a description; but the small scale of the engraving renders it impossible to do more than indicate the extreme fulness and elaboration of the decorative work which is spread over the entire surface, and contributes so much to its character. The vast extent of the building will be understood from the engraving, and from the statement that it is 262 feet long, 75 deep, and 150 high to the top of the roof. The ground floor is of Bath stone rusticated; the upper stories are of white Suffolk brick; the pierced window hoods, the carved work, balconies, &c., are of stone; the trusses, leafage, and fretted work generally of Portland cement. On the ground floor are a spacious hall reaching to the second floor, corridors, dining, drawing, and sitting rooms, coffee rooms-the principal a magnificent apartment 69 by 30 feet and 18 feet high; a smoking room, &c. The first and second floors, which are reached by the grand staircase, are chiefly devoted to suites of rooms for families; the upper rooms to bed-rooms, the top story being for servants only. On the first floor is a wide gallery, which is carried entirely round the central hall; corridors, and principal staircases lead to the various rooms. The public rooms will, it is said, be decorated with unusual splendour; the arrangements are carefully studied so as to provide for the luxurious comfort of visitors, whilst every provision is made for security in case of fire. In the exterior, as will be seen, decoration is carried to the utmost limit. In the medallions are heads of the Queen, the Prince Consort, the chief political personages, and other contemporary celebrities, and many of those of past times; at the side façade are representations of the four quarters of the globe; festoons of flowers of colossal proportions, most elaborately carved, are suspended between the windows of the ground floor; indeed the carving throughout (by Mr. Dayman) has been executed with admirable skill and spirit-the time allowed for its execution and its character as decorative work being taken into account. Altogether, the building is by far the most splendid of its class yet erected in this country, and is a great addition to the architecture of that part of London in which it stands. The architect of the Grosvenor Hotel is Mr. J. T. Knowles; the

cost will considerably exceed 100,000l. Its vicinage and that of the railway will, doubtless, stimulate the erection of other architectural works in this long too-stagnant neighbourhood. Already a large building, of showy but not very graceful character, is erecting a little way up Victoria-street for a Turkish Bath Company.

Another railway hotel of imposing dimensions is in course of completion adjoining the London-bridge railway terminus, its principal front being in St. Thomas-street. The London-bridge Hotel is 130 feet by 97, and seven stories high. Little ornament is expended on the exterior, which is of white brick with Portland stone dressings, has a heavy cornice, and terminates in a Mansard roof with dormer windows. It has a plain, substantial, but certainly not elegant appearance. The scale of the interior may be indicated by saying that on the second floor, which is on a level with the railway station, there are a public coffee-room 67 feet by 28, a ladies' coffeeroom 30 feet square, and between them a library 28 feet by 22; the floor beneath is to be a public restaurant on a grand scale, with smoking and billiard rooms, &c., and having a distinct entrance from Joiner-street; while above there are 150 private rooms, exclusive of those required by the hotel staff.

In Piccadilly two new hotels, or rather extensions of hotels already existing, have been built on a large scale, apparently in anticipation of the requirements of the Exhibition year. Of that on the north side of the way, the Gloucester, we spoke last year, when it was as yet unfinished: we can now only repeat that its only claim to notice architecturally, as far as the exterior is concerned, arises from its size. That on the south, nearly opposite, designed by Mr. E. B. Lambe an extension of the Bath Hotel, though the fronts are separated by some intervening houses-is of more pretentious exterior. It is of brick with stone dressings, very lofty, and the broken skyline and grouped chimney-shafts, make a picturesque appearance at a distance. But it has one most extraordinary novelty: the ground floor is a stable, and directly over this extends, in front of the drawing-room, a very ornamental balcony, in which, we suppose, visitors are expected to take the air.

In the country the desire for immense hotels arose earlier than in London, and is still prevalent. Many have already been erected, many more are erecting or designed. At Liverpool, one is projected on a scale rivalling those in America: it is to stand in Dale-street, contain, besides public and private rooms, 400 bed-rooms, and to cost for building about 100,000l. In Sheffield, some considerable progress has been made with one, adjoining the Victoria Station of the Great Northern Railway, designed by Mr. M. E. Hadfield, not so large, indeed, as that just spoken of, but a very capacious and rather stately structure; placed, however, in such a position as to receive full into the windows of its longest front the amazing volumes of smoke emitted from the hundred huge chimneys of the Castle grindery works, and the immense steel works adjoining, whilst immediately below the windows is the Smithfield Cattle Marketprobably a situation for a grand hotel unrivalled for unpleasantness in Europe. At Leeds one is being built close to the Midland Station, large in size, Renaissance in style, of deep red brick with stone

dressings, and well-carved ornamental work, from the designs of Mr. C. Brodrick. By the railway at Great Malvern, one of large size and very ornate character, red and black brick with stone dressings, roofs of tremendous height, and all sorts of whimsies, is erecting for the Great Malvern Hotel Company, from the designs of Mr. E. W. Elmslie. Another, designed by the same architect for the same company, but even more pretentious in character, is in course of erection at Malvern Link; and several more might be enumerated.

Our notice of the miscellaneous buildings in our provincial towns must be very brief and very general. But we may repeat that all we have seen and heard during the past months is corroborative of what we have before said of the increased interest taken in architecture. Never, probably, were there so many opportunities for architects to distinguish themselves, though, on the other hand, there were assuredly never so many candidates for distinction. Every town almost has now more than one architect, the more important towns have many, competent to design works of importance, and to design them well. We only wish that, instead of yielding so much to every phase of fashion, our younger country architects would set themselves to study the special character and circumstances of their own towns, with the view of designing with direct reference to them. Just now, in secular buildings, our younger architects are all aiming to produce something Venetian, Florentine, or, at any rate, Italian Gothic in character let them but look a little into the matter, and they will see that the reason why each of these Italian cities produced its own distinctive style, or phase of some more general style, was that each worked on a type of its own, modifying and developing what perhaps it originally received from some foreign source, so as to adapt it, as far as might be, to the local character and circumstances; and in the same way, without losing sight of general principles, there might be, by the studious employment of local materials, adaptation to local requirements, physical features, and native character, a style developed that should be at once local and characteristic, and should redeem our towns from the monotonous pattern-book aspect to which our modern buildings are fast reducing them.

Though building seems scarcely so vigorously pursued in Liverpool and Manchester as a few years back, there are still many important works proceeding in these cities. In Manchester we have the Assize Courts, ecclesiastical buildings, and others already noticed; also several more of those vast warehouses for which the city is unrivalled. The new, like the old, are, for the most part, Italian palatial in style, but some vary from the established type; notably one of which Mr. Corson is the architect, in which the style is Italian Gothic; and while the building is of stone, terra-cotta is employed in the ornamentation. Mr. E. Walters is erecting in Moseley-street a very elegant building of the style he has made classic in Manchester, for the Manchester and Salford Bank. At Liverpool we need not stay to speak further of buildings in progress, but may note, that among those which are soon to be commenced, is an Exchange of great magnificence, as may be supposed from the fact, that a capital of 360,000%. is required (and subscribed) to carry out the scheme. Birmingham is making continuous advances in shop architecture, but, unluckily