18* MONTHLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE. 



sue their avocations, and so long as we live in a land of freedom it would per- 

 haps be impolitic to place any restrictions on the exercise of professional du- 

 ties other than as the common interest of society demands, as is the case in 

 medical and surgical education. We shall now proceed to show in what man- 

 ner we conceive that a public establishment might be advantageously formed 

 for the advancement of persons intended for the professions to which we have 

 more particularly alluded. 



" The duties of civil and mining engineers are of great importance to the 

 community. Independent of the immense capital frequently placed under 

 their direction, the lives and safety of the public often depend on the skill and 

 security of their works. In mines this is particularly the case, and the nu- 

 merous accidents which from time to time occur in mines is a strong reason 

 for the advocacy of every improvement that can be readily obtained. When a 

 student has gone through a good course of education at school, followed by a 

 clerkship in the office of an engineer, the universities are now the only places 

 in which he can seek for any further accessions of knowledge. The expense, 

 the peculiar forms, and the inadequacy of the instruction for practical pur- 

 poses, at these institutions, are such as to preclude many young men from any 

 attempt to avail themselves of the privileges they afford, nor is there any other 

 establishment at present existing in which the student of these professions can 

 improve himself by a regular course of study. Such an establishment, we 

 conceive, ought to be formed in London, founded on the principle and con- 

 ducted in the manner of the Royal College of Surgeons. The objects of this 

 establishment would be as follows : To institute a regular course of studies 

 in chemistry, mineralogy, and geology, in particular; and in mechanics, hy- 

 drostatics, and other departments of physical science generally, with especial 

 reference to the works undertaken by engineers, and to the duties to be per- 

 formed by the conductors of mines. Geometry and the drawing of plans and 

 sections would form an especial object of such an establishment, and by its 

 instrumentality many important advantages might be conferred on the mining 

 interests. As branches of such a college, establishments ought to be formed 

 in the principal mining districts throughout the kingdom, where, under a 

 general system founded on and supported by the parent institution, the hum- 

 ble classes of mine agents might obtain such knowledge as would be useful to 

 them in their several departments. As regards miners, the mine itself is the 

 great school in which most is to be learnt ; but, in addition to the matter- 

 of-fact details to be learnt underground, there can be little doubt that much 

 solid advantage would flow from a more general diffusion of scientific know- 

 ledge among the practical managers of mines. 



" An intimate acquaintance with scientific details, opportunities of studying 

 mineralogy, with access to the collections in the British Museum and Geolo- 

 gical Society, attendance on regular courses of lectures, and the pursuance 

 of a methodical train of studies under the discipline of a collegiate institution, 

 together with the stimulus of acquiring some distinctive marks of proficiency, 

 would, we doubt not, tend materially to advance civil and mining engineering. 

 From the influential members of the Geological Society and of the Institution 

 of Civil Engineers, very able and efficient aid might be probably obtained in 

 the formation of such an institution, and in recommending it to the notice of 

 government. The subject is one which has for some time past received much 

 attention from those who are interested in the progress of mining and engi- 

 neering ; and the important feature which railway projects now form in the 

 commercial statistics of this kingdom is a convincing proof of the necessity of 

 cultivating, as much as possible, those useful and practical details which can 

 only be afforded by an institution expressly adapted to these objects. Such 

 an institution, we trust, will ere long be actively promoted; and, if once 

 established, we firmly believe that it would tend to increase the talent and 

 respectability of the profession of engineering would add value to public un- 

 dertakings, by the skill bestowed on their construction that it would disse- 



