.sVA' //7/././,/.]/ SIEMENS, r.R.S. 233 



still greater difficulties which crossed his path later on in life-. 

 1I-- i lid not think he need further combat the arguments he had 

 referred to. 



What the great men he had mentioned had produced in the 

 shape of steam engines, railways, steam navigation, surely these 

 i mentions and the various works for the production of iron, 

 cotton, fabrics, and so on, all require intelligent supervision, and 

 sucli intelligent supervision could not be given by those who 

 were ignorant, but by persons who must have knowledge of the 

 j m H -esses which were being earned on. If the persons in charge 

 had not the necessary knowledge, the comfort, happiness, and 

 even the lives of Her Majesty's liege subjects would be sacrificed 

 in various ways. It would not therefore be safe for them to trust 

 themselves, their lives, convenience and comfort to illiterate 

 persons to persons without knowledge of the processes they had 

 to superintend and direct. It was there where technical education 

 became a necessity. 



He would go even further, and say that this education had 

 been for some length of time neglected in this country. We had 

 been content with our position, and had rather allowed things to 

 go on as they were, until we saw on the other side of the channel 

 that the nations of the continent had established schools for 

 higher and lower education, and had by that means produced 

 classes of men eminently qualified for superintending their rail- 

 ways, their telegraphs, and other works, and by dint of that 

 intelligence and information, they had been able to raise up a very 

 powerful competition. 



It would be wrong to suppose that the natural wealth of 

 coal, iron, and such other products were confined to this island. 

 Nothing of the sort. In other countries there were vast deposits 

 of these minerals. In the United States there were deposits of 

 coal, perhaps ten times more important in volume than ours, and 

 the ironstone was infinitely more important also. Therefore the 

 race of competition had truly set in between nation and nation, 

 and it was a competition and warfare that redounded to the honour 

 and profit of all parties concerned, and for one he hopea the time 

 was not far distant when civilised nations would confine their war- 

 fare to the production of means for the comfort and development 

 of the human species, instead of excelling one another in the thick- 



