The improvements introduced by Panizzi into the internal arrangements of the Old Reading-Room were nevertheless trivial in comparison with those which he was destined to accomplish by the construction of a new one.
In 1850, he submitted to the Trustees his first plan for a new Reading-Room. As this, however, involved the acquisition of land and the consequent erection of new buildings, it was rejected on account of the delay and expense which would inevitably follow. The next plan of reform relating to the enlargement of the capacities of the Museum in general was brought forward by the Trustees themselves. This or a similar scheme had long since been mooted, but was regularly formulated for the first time in 1848. Their proposal was to buy up the whole of one portion of the street, on the east side of the Museum, to build on the site, and to complete that part of the edifice which faced Russell Square with a grand façade. This scheme, the cost of which was calculated to amount to only about a quarter of a million, did not receive the favourable consideration of Government. There is much reason to be thankful that the infliction of a second grand façade has been spared us. The first sketch for the New Reading-Room was drawn by Panizzi himself on April 18, 1852, and shown to Mr. Winter Jones on the same day.
On May 5 following, Panizzi sent in a report setting forth at large, and in forcible terms, the discomfort and inconvenience existing in his own Department of the Institution, and recommending, as a remedy, the construction of the new building in the inner quadrangle. It will not be amiss to give this report _in extenso_, as it will present something more than a sketch of the work intended—omitting, of course, all minor and unimportant details.
“Mr. Panizzi has the honour to submit the following statement and suggestions to the Trustees, in the hope that the pressing importance of the subject will be deemed a sufficient apology for thus urging it once more on their early and favourable consideration.”
“It is a known and admitted fact that there is no more available space in which to arrange books in a proper and suitable manner in the Printed Book Department; that the collection is, therefore, falling, and will continue to fall, into arrears, the consequences of which are also too well known to be here further insisted upon; that want of accommodation in the Reading-Rooms, not only for readers, but for books of reference and for catalogues, prevents many persons from making use of the collection of printed books, whilst actual readers pursue their researches and studies amidst many and various discomforts, all owing to the crowded state of those rooms.”
