124 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE AIMS OP THE NATIONAL PHYSICAL LABORA- 

 TORY OF GREAT BRITAIN.* 



By R. T. GLAZEBROOK, F.R.S., 



DIRECTOR OF THE NATIONAL PHYSICAL LABORATORY. 



A SPEAKER who is privileged to deliver an experimental lecture 

 ■^-^ from this place is usually able to announce some brilliant dis- 

 covery of his own, or at least to illustrate his words by some striking 

 experiment. To-night it is not in my power to do this, and I am 

 thereby at a disadvantage. Still I value highly this opportunity which 

 has been given me of making known to this audience the aims and pur- 

 pose of the National Laboratory. 



The idea of a physical laboratory in which problems bearing at 

 (mce on science and industry might be solved is comparatively new. 

 The Physikalisch-technische Reichsanstalt, founded in Berlin by 

 the joint labors of Werner von Siemens and von Helmholtz during 

 the years 1883-87, was perhaps the first. It is less than ten years since 

 Dr. Lodge, in his address to Section A of the British Association, out- 

 lined the scheme of work for such an institution here in England. 



Nothing came of this; a committee met and discussed plans, but 

 it was felt to be hopeless to approach the government, and without 

 government aid there were no funds. Four years later, however, the 

 late Sir Douglas Galton took the matter up. In his address to the 

 British Association in 1895 and again in a paper read before Section 

 A, he called attention to the work done for Germany by the Reichsan- 

 stalt, and to the crying need for a similar institution in England. The 

 result of this presidential pronouncement was the formation of a com- 

 mittee which reported at Liverpool, giving a rough outline of a possible 

 scheme of organization. 



A petition to Lord Salisbury followed, and as a consequence a 

 Treasury committee, with Lord Rayleigh in the chair, was appointed 

 to consider the desirability of establishing a National Physical Labora- 

 tory. The committee examined over thirty witnesses and then re- 

 ported unanimously, "That a public institution should be founded for 

 standardizing and verifying instruments, for testing materials, and for 

 the determination of physical constants." It is natural to turn to the 

 words of those who were instrumental in securing the appointment of 

 this committee and to the evidence it received in any endeavor to dis- 



A discourse delivered at the Royal Institution. 



