NA 7 URE 



169 



THURSDAY, APRIL 6, 191 1. 



ARTS AND INDUSTRIES IN THE 

 ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA. 

 Collection of Articles on Industries and Manufactures 

 (loose sheets) from the New (Eleventh) Edition of 

 the ''Encyclopaedia Britannica." (Cambridge: 

 University Press, n.d.) 



THIS collection of technical articles from the 

 Encyclopaedia Britannica must be taken as con- 

 sisting- of samples only, since it does not go beyond 

 the first half of the alphabet — "Alkali Manufacture" 

 to " Iron and Steel "—and even for that half it is 

 certainly incomplete. There must be more than as 

 i many more articles which in any reasonable classifica- 

 tion would be included in the category of technical. 

 Hence even if the reviewer were endowed with a 

 mind encyclopaedic enough for the task, it would not 

 be possible from the examples to criticise the work as a 

 whole, to test it as it should be tested, by hunting up 

 subjects with which the critic is familiar, and seeing 

 how the work comes out of the trial. All that can 

 be done is to take the specimens, and to form such 

 opinion upon them as we may, minimising any 

 deficiency in omniscience by the simple (and usual) ex- 

 pedient of dwelling on the familiar and ignoring the 

 unknown. But, after all, the material is ample 

 enough even if it be but a tenth of the whole— 

 Tr'S.f'ovfjfiicrvTrdvTos — we really have got more than we 

 want. 



It would be too much to say that there is real 

 uniformity in the method of treatment. Humanly 

 that were impossible. But there is a much nearer 

 approach to uniformity than in the older editions, so 

 far as can be judged from the selected articles. Per- 

 haps it would be more evident in other than the 

 technical sections. In these there seems to 

 have been a good deal of compression. On 

 the whole, the articles, especially the longer 

 articles, seem to be shorter than those in the ninth 

 edition. Perhaps in some cases the material has 

 been transferred to other headings. Often the 

 historical part has disappeared, or been abbreviated. 

 The modern articles seem more sternly practical than 

 their predecessors. Sometimes this is a pity, and it 

 makes one hope that not all the old series will be 

 exchanged for the new version, and sent to be 

 pulped. Perhaps now that we are all utilising the 

 completed applications of science, it does not much 

 matter how they have been developed, but to some 

 misguided folk the history of invention is not the 

 least interesting of the various branches of human 

 history. 



It is, of course, in the method of treatment that 

 the various articles show a certain lack of uniformity. 

 Some are too technical. The first on our list, 

 •' Alkali Manufacture," which seems quite new, 

 though perhaps part of the information in it may 

 liave appeared under some other heading in the ninth 

 edition, errs, to our mind, in this respect. It is an 

 excellent and clearly written account of the manu- 

 NO. 2162, VOL. 86] 



facture in its modern forms, but it would be hardly 

 intelligible to anybody who had no knowledge of 

 chemistry. The allied articles " Bleaching " and 

 " Dyeing," are quite different in character, and are 

 better adapted for their immediate purpose. The 

 expert does not need to apply for information about 

 his own subject to an encyclopaedia, and the writer 

 of an article for an encyclopasdia has no right to 

 assume that his reader has even the small amount 

 of technical knowledge required to make him under- 

 stand the sort of article which to the expert might 

 seem commonplace. 



The article on " Electricity Supply " seems an 

 admirable model for any writer to follow. It con- 

 tains just the information which would be needed, 

 say, for the owner of a country-house, who is think- 

 ing of installing the electric light, while it is also 

 an admirably condensed and clear account of the 

 latest development of the subject. " Electro- 

 metallurgy " is good, but incomplete, no doubt be- 

 cause certain parts of the subjects are dealt with 

 in articles such as "Electrochemistry," not included 

 in our bundle. 



Some of the articles are very interesting, because 

 when compared with the corresponding articles in 

 previous editions they show very clearly the progress 

 of invention. Notable in this way, for instance, is 

 "Bicycle." In 1875 the latest novelty was the old 

 "Ordinary," really an extremely dangerous machine. 

 The supplement had "cycling," but not "bicycle" 

 (encyclopaedia articles are wont to find themselves 

 under the latest convenient letter of the alphabet), 

 and now we have a very full and excellent account of 

 the modern machine. 



Other articles indicate that certain industries have 

 changed but little in the past two and twenty years. 

 Take "Clocks," for instance. The long and admir- 

 able treatise contributed by the late Lord Grimthorpe 

 to the older edition has been rewritten and 

 shortened by some three pages. If we omit the 

 account of electrical clocks, there does not seem very 

 much new matter in it, but a good deal appears to 

 have been judiciously left out. 



Perhaps the most important, as it is the longest, 

 of our batch is the article on "Iron and Steel." It 

 is much less than half the length of the correspond- 

 ing article in the previous edition (some thirty-four 

 pages as compared with eighty-four), by the late 

 Dr. Alder Wright. The opinion may be expressed, 

 though with considerable hesitation, since it could 

 only be justified by a minute and careful comparison 

 of the two articles, that on the whole the longer 

 article of the ninth edition gave a better account of 

 the state of the manufacture in 1881, the year of its 

 publication, than the present one does of its condi- 

 tion in 191 1. At the same time, it does give a full, and 

 no doubt accurate account of recent advances, and per- 

 haps most of what is omitted has become of little 

 more than historical interest. As time goes on 

 Bessemer and Mushet and Siemens must take their 

 place with Cort and Darby and Dud Dudley, but 

 it is early days yet for that. We should have thought 

 that some account might have been given of the 



