SCIENCE IN ITS USEFUL APPLICATIONS. 393 



Society ; with Professor Braiide, the pupil and successor of Davy, at 

 the Royal Institution, long time one of the Secretaries of the Royal 

 Society, an early President of the Chemical Society, and, in his pro- 

 fessional capacity. Director of the Die Department at the Royal Mint ; 

 with Sir Robert Christison, of Edinburgh, one of the most scientific of 

 British toxicologists and pharmacologists, an original worker in many 

 fields of inquiry, President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and a 

 selected, though not an actual. President of the British Association ; 

 with Dr. Warren de la Rue, the friend of us all, more than once Presi- 

 dent of the Chemical Society, and a Vice-President, Medalist, and 

 Bakerian Lecturer of the Royal Society ; with Dr. Hofraann, the first 

 Professor at the College of Chemistry, and Assayer for many years to 

 the Mint, one who can claim so many of us as his pupils, and who, as 

 a professional chemist, no less than as an investigator and teacher, ever 

 set an example of energy and vivacity to all his associates, working 

 on one occasion the long night through in order to extract from paraf- 

 tine-oil a specimen of benzene, ready for exhibition in court on the fol- 

 lowing morning, an instance of professional devotion which, as the 

 presence of my immediate predecessor. Sir Frederick Abel, reminds 

 me, is not wholly without a parallel. Proceeding in my enumeration, I 

 may mention Sir Robert Kane, then of Cork, a teacher and worker of 

 originality and wide erudition, to whom chemists are indebted for 

 their now familiar conception of amidogen ; also Dr. Allen Miller, 

 Professor at King's College, London, and Assayer to the Mint, a Presi- 

 dent of the Chemical Society, and for many years Treasurer of the 

 Royal Society ; also Sir Lyon Playfair, then Professor of Chemistry 

 at the University of Edinburgh, now a member of her Majesty's Privy 

 Council and President of the British Association, one to whom we are 

 indebted for his hearty sympathy with the objects of the Institute, 

 and for the unsparing exercise of his efforts and influence on our 

 behalf ; also my relative by marriage, Alfred Smee, a pioneer in elec- 

 tro-metallurgy, and inventor of the galvanic battery by which for the 

 third of a century the greater part of the galvano-plastic work of this 

 country has been effected ; and lastly, Robert Warington, chemist for 

 many years to the Society of Apothecaries, the founder and first Secre- 

 tary of the Chemical Society, and a frequent contributor thereto of 

 his characteristically ingenious observations. And not only with the 

 above-named eminent men of science, but with many others also, has 

 it been my fortune to be professionally associated, including, I regret- 

 fully have to add among those who have passed away from us, some 

 of the most distinguished original members and warmest friends of 

 the Institute, as Dr. Stenhouse, Sir William Siemens, Professor Way, 

 Dr. Angus Smith, Dr. Voelcker, and Mr. Walter Weldon. Moreover, 

 among the leading men of science of the present day. Sir Frederick 

 Abel, Mr. Crookes, Professor Dewar, Professor Frankland, Mr. Vernon 

 Harcourt, Dr. Tyndall, and Dr. Williamson, are either the holders of 



