1902. J The Bight Ron. Sir John Macdonald on Auto-Oars. HI 



WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, 



Friday, April 18, 1902. 



His Grace the Duke of Nobthumberland, K.G. D.C.L. F.R.S., 

 President, in the Chair. 



The Bioht Hon. Sir John H. A. Macdonald, K.C.B. LL.D. 



F.R.SS.(L.&E.), M.I.E.E., 



Lord Justice-Clerk of Scotland. 



Auto-Gare. 



When the governing body of this venerable and honoured institution 

 asks that a lecture be delivered upon the Auto-Car, and when such 

 an assemblage is gathered together as I see before me to listen, it is 

 manifest tliat motor traction has become a practical factor in land 

 locomotion. No doubt very considerable differences of opinion exist 

 in the community about it, and I suppose those differences are fully 

 represented in this room. There are the keen enthusiasts, of whom 

 a few are here ; there are the people who are favourable, but hold- 

 ing back — looking for what they call developments — which I find 

 generally means a first-rate engine and an extremely handsome 

 carriage at a " Cheap Jack " price. Then we have the coldly in- 

 different, who will not give their countenance to automobilism until 

 it has got a little stronger in influence than it is now. And lastly, 

 there are the uncompromising opponents, who hate the motor of the 

 road with a hatred as cordial as that which their grandfathers and 

 great-grandfathers bestowed upon the motor of the iron railway. 



But 1 do not think that any one fails now to recognise that auto- 

 mobilism is certain to progress, for pleasure, for social convenience, for 

 business travelling and for commerce. It has been bitterly opposed 

 in the past, and no doubt it will be bitterly opposed still ; but nothing 

 will stop its progress, because it has become quite manifest to those 

 who have looked into the matter with care that it is going to confer 

 very great benefits upon the community — in some cases beneiits which 

 can hardly be measured. I cannot enter upon these to-night, and I 

 shall only say — and I think the contention cannot be disputed — 

 that at the present moment in this case, as in so very many cases in 

 the past, those who are most keenly opposed to motor traction on the 

 road are the very people to whom it will bring the greatest benefit. 

 The squire and the farmer, the local tradesman and the country inn- 

 keeper, these form the classes who put every obstacle they can in the 

 way of motor traction. They are so short-sighted as not to see that 

 it means for them a revival of the road such as seemed absolutely 

 and for ever impossible since the days when the iron horse swept the 

 traffic from the highways of the country. Now we have reached a 



