refusing to allow the $10 million underwater institute to encroach on its East Broadway property.

The request was made this week by Fidelity International Limited, whose charity foundation is funding half the cost of the institute.

Fidelity International Limited executive vice president Mr. Phillip de Cristo said the Trust owed it to tourists and Bermudians to reconsider its position.

In a letter to the Trust, copied to Press, Mr. de Cristo said: "As the tenant with such a long lease, we feel that the National Trust might have been graceful enough to have consulted Fidelity International and sought our formal views before taking the extreme stance it has done.'' Trust director Ms Amanda Outerbridge said the letter was discussed at the regular meeting of the executive committee last night and there was no change in the Trust's objections.

She stressed it was not the development that was opposed but "the scale of development on that site.'' The Trust would prepare a response to Mr. de Cristo's letter.

Fidelity, a Bermuda-based mutual fund company rents its Pembroke Hall headquarters from the Trust.

The Board of Trustees of the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute are proposing to build it on land next to Pembroke Hall.

But the outdoor seating area and some of the walkway was designed to encroach on the historic Pembroke Hall property.

Mr. de Cristo said Fidelity did not share the Trust's view that the BUEI would "degrade Pembroke Hall's integrity''.

And he said the Trust's stance was forcing Fidelity workers to continue using a "dangerous'' access road "indefinitely''.

"We feel the institute will greatly enhance Pembroke Hall,'' he said in the letter.

Encroachments would be made on a "very small portion of Pembroke Hall''. And that portion was home to an "unsightly'' concrete wall.

"Surely this is not an area worth having a dispute over...,'' he said.

"Logically, an outdoor seating area, open to the public of Bermuda must be accepted as a vast improvement over the concrete wall.'' Encroachments on the Trust's property would also improve the safety of the access road.

"As landlord, you are obviously unaware of the current dangerous conditions that face us as tenants, our visitors and anyone who wishes to leave Pembroke Hall and travel east.'' Motorists were forced to cross two lanes of traffic, use the bakery as a roundabout, while dealing with a blind corner.

"Why there has not been a serious accident at that spot is nothing short of amazing,'' he said.

The BUEI builders wanted to replace the access road with a safer and better engineered entrance, he said.

He added the 15-foot encroachment into the fore shore would in fact "tidy-up'' the waterfront.

"To conclude, let me state that Fidelity International pride ourselves on the superb job of reconstruction we have done at a cost of over $3 million -- out of our pockets -- for a building Fidelity gave to the Trust.'' Mr. de Cristo further pointed out Fidelity, being a good tenant and corporate citizen, purchased and cleaned up the Butterfield site -- after promising to turn it over to the Trust in ten years.

The institute was an "an excellent and ideal'' use for the site and was designed to compliment the domestic architectural style of Pembroke Hall, he said.

The Trust had launched an official objection to the plans, which are currently before the Development Applications Board. It objected to the BUEI's size, height and infringements on the foreshore and Pembroke Hall property.

If approval is given, the institute is expected to open in late 1995 or early 1996.

It will offer rotating exhibits from renowned maritime museums and institutions plus high-tech exhibits and simulations allowing visitors to explore the world's oceans on their own.