Mr Monkey crossed Kensington Gore and set off down Exhibition Road. He stopped to look at a statue of the explorer Shackleton on the side of the Royal Geographic Society, but completely missed the statue of Livingstone on the other side of building. He went along to the underground station by the long subway, and noticed that the paving had been installed by the rather splendid sounding Wilke's Metallic Flooring Co. Ld., who mixed Portland cement with iron slag. The subway was opened by the District Railway in 1885 at the start of an Inventions Exhibition, and they used to charge a penny to get into it. Mr Monkey scampered along for free, and took a train to Euston Square.
You can read about Wilke's metallic flooring in the February 27th 1886 edition of the Scientific American Supplement by scrolling quite a way down at the Fullbooks website.
Copyright Rik Shepherd and Mr Monkey. This page last modified 2 December 2007