“Are we never,” asks the writer, “to take risks in our architecture?” and his answer, briefly summed up, is “Perish the thought. De l’audace, encore de l’audace, toujours de l’audace.” It is, of course, a pity that the Winchester War Memorial scheme has not met with the unanimous approval of Wykehamists.  Possibly they have reason, for while adding a new cloister, a new gateway and a new hall to the existing school buildings, it involves the pulling down of the Quingentenary Memorial Building, erected some twenty years ago, and of some old houses in Kingsgate Street.  Some consider such a drastic destruction to be unfortunate, but, says The Times, it is “necessary if any scheme worthy of the occasion is to be carried out.”  Moreover it is proposed to re-erect the Quingentenary Memorial on a new site, “where it will certainly look as well as ever.”

The greatest event in our history, as the writer finely observes, cannot be worthily commemorated by any timid compromise.  Winchester has set a splendid example, but it is perhaps too much to expect that it will be followed by London, owing to the inevitable clash of conflicting interests in our unwieldy metropolis.  The erection of a new Pantheon on the site of St. Paul’s and the removal of WREN’S massive but demode structure to Hampstead Heath, where it would certainly look as well as ever, is, we fear, however much The Times may desire it, beyond the range of practical politics.  But example is infectious, and if only the Winchester authorities would expand their scheme and carry it out with Dantonesque audacity to its full logical conclusion, other towns and cities might ultimately fall into line.

Winchester Cathedral, as we need hardly remind our readers, has only been rescued from subsidence and collapse at an immense cost by a lavish use of the resources of modern engineering.  The building itself is not without merits, but its site is inconspicuous and the swampy nature of the soil is a constant menace to its durability.  The scheme which we venture with all humility to suggest is that it should be removed and re-erected, in the same spirit though in the architectural language of our own day, on the summit of St. Catherine’s Hill, where it would look better than ever, and be connected by a scenic neo-Gothic railway with Meads.  This would not only add to the amenities of the landscape, but enable the present cathedral site to be utilized for a purpose more in consonance with the needs of the age.  We do not presume to dictate, but may point out that if the deanery and the canons’ houses were pulled down and re-erected on the golf-links, where they would look better than ever, space would be available for a majestic aerodrome, or, better still, an experimental water-stadium for submarines, in memory of KING ALFRED, the founder of our Fleet.