52 THE ADDRESSES, LECTURES, ETC., OF 



in Persia on the erection of the line for the Indo-European 

 Telegraph Company, and that all reports, both official and private, 

 which I have received, speak of a willingness, both on the part of 

 the Persian government, and of the inhabitants, to facilitate our 

 operations. 



In the districts along the Mekran coast it may be necessary to 

 subsidize certain chiefs, but British experience in the wild country 

 between Bagdad and Fao proves that the demands of those chiefs 

 are very moderate, and that they discharge their obligations as 

 protectors most faithfully, inasmuch as no line in Asiatic Turkey 

 has been less subject to interruption than that between Bagdad 

 and Fao. Moreover, the Mekran coast line is only a necessary 

 alternative to the submarine line from the Persian Gulf in case of 

 the latter being interrupted. 



In conclusion, I wish to state that I am not here to disparage 

 the construction of submarine telegraphs either in the Red Sea or 

 elsewhere ; but what I maintain is that they should stand on their 

 own commercial merits in the same manner as the Atlantic Cable 

 or the lines of the Indo-European Telegraph Company do, and that 

 it would certainly be unjustifiable that the government should sub- 

 sidize one without subsidizing every line to India. 



I am, Sir, your obedient servant, 



C. W. SIEMENS. 



3, GREAT GEORQE STREET, WESTMINSTER, S.W., Dec. 7. 



ADDRESS 

 Of C. WILLIAM SIEMENS, F.R.S.* 



President of Section G (the Mechanical Section] of the British 

 Association, delivered on the 19th August, 1869. 



IN addressing you from this chair, I feel that I have accepted a 

 task, which, however flattering, I should have hesitated to under- 

 take, had I not every reason to rely on your forbearance, and upon 



* Excerpt Journal of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, 

 1869, pp. 200-206. 



