PUBLIC OPINION

New Zealand Times, Volume L, Issue 11583, 28 July 1923, Page 15

PUBLIC OPINION

NATIONAL, MUSEUM. (To the Editor “N.Z. Times.”) Sir, —It must be a matter ol general satisfaction that Sir John Luke, has 'brought the matter of the National ; Museum before Parliament. The tremondous risk run in leaving irreplaceable collections in the present old wooden building noeda no emphasising. . If the museum is to he built, cannot some interest Be aroused in combining a permanent art gallery and war memorial in the tsame scheme? Sir Harold , Beauchamp’s fine gift of £IO,OOO to tbe | city makes the long-desired art gallery lan urgent matter, and the combination !of a splendid soldiers’ memorial seems to me a practical solution of many great difficulties. I think many citizens feel that if the returned soldiers wish to have a permanent cenotaph erected in Manners street; that it should be done, but That the larger amount of money might with advantage be spent as I propose now to indicate. * The finest scheme that has yet been suggested is, in my'opinion, that the National Museum and permanent Art Gallery should be in bne building, and that the entrance to this building should be through a hall of valour, where brave deeds could be memorialised through all the years to come. At the entrance to this hall of valour a memorial to those who gave their lives in the Great War might take the form of a fine group of statuary. If the scheme were adopted, everyone who entered the museum or the National Art Gallery would have to pass through this hall, thus keeping in' remembrance the hollowed dead. I hope that citizens will show their interest in this matter, and that Wellington may no longer lag behind other cities in the building of their war memorial. M. E. B. TRIBE. Selwyn terrace, Wellington,