The New Zealand Times. SATURDAY, MAY 27, 1911. THE METROPOLIS OF MILLIONS

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7451, 27 May 1911, Page 4

The New Zealand Times. SATURDAY, MAY 27, 1911. THE METROPOLIS OF MILLIONS

During the last decennial period, we learn by cable to-day, the population of England and Wales increased 10.91 per centum, standing now at 36,075,000, as against 32,527,843 in 1901. Tho increase is substantial, but shows a falling-off as compared with tlib increases recorded in previous decennial periods. In all probability it will be found, when further figures are to hand, that there has been a larger tide of emigration, and this, with a lower ■birth-rate, would account for this failure to maintain tho percentage of increase in previous periods. To-day, however , leaving aside tho greater question of tho nation’s increase as a whole, we aro tempted to refer to the stupendous augmentation which is recorded of tho population of the capital of tho Empire. The figures we are ablo to quote prove that London well maintains her p'ro-erainence as the greatest city that civilisation, modern or ancient, has known. It is true there is o decrease of 13.306 in the population of tho administrative County of London, which now stands at 4,536,267, a decrease owing, no doubt, to the everincreasing tendency of the to push out into tho suburban districts. But Greater London, which comprises the city and the Metropolitan Pblice districts, and includes every parish tho whole of which is within fifteen miles of Charing Cross, or any portion of which is within twelve miles thereof, has grown from in 1901 to 7.252,963, an increase of no less than 671,661. Estimates as to the probable future growth of the Modern Babylon vary considerably. Tho' Statistical Officer of tho London County Council has given it' as his opinion that in twenty years from now London’s minimum population will he close upon ten millions. Without endeavouring to probe the future tho facts as to London’s growth are already sufficiently marvellous. To-day London possesses a population close upon three millions greater than that of either all Scptland or all Ireland; more than is possessed by Australia and New Zealand combined. It has been said that modern London grows steadily in two directions, upwards in tho centre, and outwards at tho outskirts. Although in the City of London proper, which is little more than a square mile in area, the resident population increases, the constant displacement within tho Inner Circle of old buildings by new edifices of much greater height arrests to some extent tho outward movement. Every year sees more and more huge blocks of residential flats erected. The flat, at first regarded with suspicion as an alien and peculiarly un-British institution, has, it is now recognised,.come to stay. On the other hand, tho extraordinary extension of cheap and rapid communication with tho suburbs by .mean’s of tho “tube” electric railways has had the effect of removing the congestion which threatened many oldestablished residential districts in the centre of London. London, in fact, adjusts herself steadily and smoothly to tho exigencies of her increased population,, and of overcrowding, save in a few quarters, there is probably less today in the metropolis than has ever been tho case.

Still, the world’s greatest city in point of population, London makes equally astonishing progress in the conveniences, comforts, and luxuries she offers to her citizens and tho strangers within her gates. Every year witnesses, some striking transformation. Wide thoroughfares such as Charing Cross Road, Shaftesbury Avenue, and Kingsway have ploughed through and practically extinguished dingy, dirty purlieus. Gardens and spacious squares have replaced slum centres; whole quarters have been demolished as completely as if a pockney Baron Hanssmann had been at work. Noble monuments have been erected, administrative buildings, second in architectural grace and beauty to none in Europe, have sprung into existence. All over the metropolis are seen the results of a wisely-ordered regard for the convenience of the public and the dignity with which so mighty a city should properly be invested. London has not yet consuered her smoke nuisance, and smoke and fog still, in tho winter months, constitute a most disagreeable atmospheric compound. But there is a peculiar beauty in the hazy evenings of autumn, when, as Andrew Lang has written —discussing the “ best aspect of Piccadilly ” —“ the lingering light flushes the houses .... while all down through the gradual dusky veil of evening the serpentine lines of lamps begin to burn.” Yes, London has a charm, a fascination that is all her own. Travellers may wax enthusiastic over the vivacious aspect of tho Boulevard des Italiens, the beauty of the leafy palace-bordered Avenue dea Champs Elysees; may expatiate upon the gorgeous military monuments of Berlin, or the spacious splendour of the Viennese Prater, or belaud the somewhat flamboyant attractions of New York’s “ Great "White Way ” —but the Londoner, remembering, say, Piccadilly on a sunny day in June, the grave, silent charm of Kensington Gardens, or the fine sweep of water prospect which greets his eye as he looks up or down the Thames Embankment need fear no |

comparisons ’twixt his beloved Cockayne and tho cities of other lands. It lias been said that so far from be ing merely one town, London “is really a hundred townlets amalgamated.” But it is probably the very variety afforded by this great “ wandering wilderness of bricks and mortar,” as good Dr Johnson called his favourite city, which constitutes, alike to resident and visitor, its chief charm. Vastly as London lias been improved in the con veniences of communication between one point and another, it has not as yet been “Haussmannised ” into monotony. A saunter along tho “sunny side of Pall Mall ” can be contrasted with the hustle and bustle of the Strand and Cheapsido. The noisy clamour of the riverside in the East has its opposite pole in the almost slumbrous calm of Kensington Gardens. ■Westminster Abbey, the Tower, tho Monument, even the carefully-pre-served Elizabefhan houses on Holhorn servo to remind tho visitor that London is a city with a past as glorious as her present. In no other city in the world can different epochs of history bo so readily studied in its edifices.

That such a city, a city of such stupendous wealth, a city which offers to every possible amusement, every conceivable luxury, should annually attract an immense number of visitors, and so large a proportion of new citizens need cause no surprise. The attractions of urban life for the countryman may be greatly deplored, but the spell of London is a siren-like charm which it is difficult to withstand. For many, alas, the lights of London town —“the gleaming lamps of London that gem the city’s crown ” —are often false beacons, guiding only to misery and despair. But the same esn he said, and with equal truth, of the lights of all great cities, and, sad though it he to read of the poverty, the grim fight for mere existence which is the unhappy lot of so many who help to make up tho toll of seven millions and odd people, it is good to know that in no city in the world is there a greater and more constant outflow of welldirected charitable and philanthropic endeavour than in Britain’s great capital. As to London’s future, who shall venture to predict? Will she suffer the fato of so many great cities now cities only of the past? Will tho day come, when, as Horace Walpole wrote to his friend Mann: “ Some curious traveller from Lima will visit England and give a description of the ruins of St. Paul’s, like the editions of Balbeo and Palmyra”? The surmise may be left to the future to verify or falsify. For the present London remains, what she lias been for so long—the greatest city the world has known. So long as the British Empire lasts her wealth and glory must remain paramount.