PRESIDENT S ADDRESS. XCV11. 



of roads and regulation of traffic, was lately held at Paris, 

 and was attended by delegates from 29 countries. The chief 

 decision, arrived at almost unanimously, was that the proper use 

 of tar for holding together the materials used in making the 

 road produced an almost dustless and waterproof road with a 

 great diminution in the annual cost for repairs, and caused none 

 of the unpleasant effects which had occurred when quantities of 

 crude tar had been applied on the surface only. It is proposed 

 to erect works near Dublin for producing gas from peat, which is 

 to be used for making electricity for power purposes, and as 

 there will be valuable by-products, it is thought that the plan 

 will be successful. It is curious to read, when one has seen 

 defunct windmills in various parts of the country, that the 

 demand for these machines was never so great as it is at present, 

 but such appears to be the fact. A new tunnel under the 

 Thames has been successfully finished, and another is being 

 made in Canada by the somewhat novel method of sinking side 

 by side in a huge trench dredged across the river two immense 

 steel cylinders, each 262 feet long, and embedding them in 

 concrete, thus making a double tunnel in which the trains will 

 run. The deepest boring in Britain has lately been made to the 

 depth of 4,534^ feet, the temperature increasing on the average 

 one degree Fah. in every 87 feet. As it is improbable that this 

 bore is really vertical, any more than those in South Africa, of 

 which I spoke at some length in my address last year, and of 

 which careful measurements were taken, showing that in some 

 instances the real depth of the bottom of the borehole below the 

 surface was only half the length of the bore, owing to deviations 

 of direction these temperature results must be received with 

 reservation. In Egypt the Esneh dam on the Nile has been 

 completed, and will more than double the crops on about 

 250,000 acres. The dam is composed of stone piers and arches, 

 containing flood gates and resting on concrete and iron piles. 

 Finally, I come to a matter which will, I am sure, give much 

 gratification to some of our lady Members, or at all events to 

 their servants, who will in future have scientific authority for the 



