On March 5, 1908, the general committee were again summoned to the Mansion House to receive the further recommendations of the executive committee after their consultation with an advisory committee consisting of seven persons, five of whom were members of the Royal Academy. The meeting confirmed the recommendation that a statue be erected in Park Crescent, Portland Place, at a cost of not less than L100,000, and an additional L100,000, if collected, "to be administered by an international committee for the furtherance of Shakespearian aims." What was remarkable to me about this meeting was the small attendance. There could not have been more than two dozen persons present. I believe I was the only one there to raise a debate on the report, and, my objections being ignored, letters from me appeared the next day in the _Times_ and the _Daily News_ attacking the constitution of the committee selected to approve of the design. Among those chosen there was not one Shakespearian scholar, no poet, and no dramatist. What, then, would be the effect upon the designers of having to submit their models to a committee of this kind? Instead of the artists giving their faculties full play to produce some original and great piece of sculpture worthy of Shakespeare's genius, they would be striving to design something specially suited to meet the limited and, perhaps, prejudiced ideas of their judges (the professional experts), while the general committee, responsible to the public for the National Memorial, would be handing over its duties to an academy which had never shown any special appreciation of the poet and his plays; for, so far as my experience goes, there never has been a Shakespearian picture exhibited on the walls of the Royal Academy which was not, as to costume and in idea, a burlesque of the dramatist's intentions, always excepting those painted by Seymour Lucas, R.A., who, strange to say, was not one of the judges selected. But it soon became evident from correspondence in the newspapers that the project of a statue in Portland Place did not satisfy the wishes of a very large number of influential men, and of a very important section of the public. Accordingly, a public meeting took place at the Lyceum Theatre, under the presidency of Lord Lytton, on Tuesday May 19, 1908, when a resolution was carried in favour of a National Theatre as a memorial to Shakespeare. Steps were then taken to amalgamate the existing Shakespeare Memorial Committee with the National Theatre Committee. A new executive was nominated, and again, for the third time, the general committee was summoned on March 23, 1909, to receive and sanction the report, which recommended the raising by subscription of L500,000 to build and endow a theatre in which Shakespeare's plays should be acted for at least one day in each week.