NOTES 149 



Even if the answer to all these questions is in the negative, 

 yet surely it would be wise to encourage as much as possible 

 all the inventive genius in the country. Could not special 

 committees, or even departments, be formed for doing this ? 

 If, as many suppose, the war may last for years, it will yet 

 be not too late to work in this direction. Had we as a nation 

 done more to organise research, we should probably have 

 already been in a position to utilise this kind of genius to its 

 utmost. But stupidity always punishes itself, and it is quite 

 possible that many of our losses are, to speak frankly, chiefly 

 due to this quality. 



A Letter from the Front 



How much the wretched payment given to men of science 

 in this country is exercising their minds may be gathered from 

 a letter which we have received from a very capable junior 

 worker now at the front. He says : " I have been hoping that 

 the war might have as one good result the better treatment of 

 the scientist in England, but judging from the Aniline Dye 

 affair, as I read of it in the papers, things are if anything a little 

 worse than ever, and the Government will make no attempt to 

 utilise the scientific ability of the country, neither will it give 

 the scientist any opportunity of working out his own salvation. 

 I hoped to return, if I return, to more favourable conditions ; 

 but, as far as I can see, with the Universities probably poorer 

 and meaner than ever, there will be no hope for a young 

 research worker to make the scantiest living after the war, and 

 I presume the country will economise by cutting off the grant 

 of five thousand pounds a year (is it not ?) to the R.S. for 

 research work. ... Is anything being done to further the 

 interests of the research worker (which are the interests of 

 the country) at home ? . . . Naturally, when there is a lull out 

 here I cannot help wondering whether I have any prospects at 

 all to return to, or whether I shall come back to find the few 

 underpaid posts that might be open filled by the stay-at- 

 homes. ... A lot of us out here feel that Germans are having 

 a pretty good time in England now, and will have a better one 

 when the war is over. The men are worried by hearing of the 

 things like Canon Lyttelton's speech, the reports that German 

 agents are stirring up strikes (why are Germans at large ?), and 

 the very favourable treatment of German officers in England. 



