NA TURE 



73 



THURSDAY, MAY 24, 1! 



THE POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE. 



EVERY middle-aged inhabitant of the British Islands 

 must recall more than one occasion when the mind 

 of our country has been strongly stirred on the question 

 of national defence. The adverse evidence of an expert, 

 a rousing article in a newspaper, has often awakened 

 general anxiety of more or less continuance, and followed 

 by more or less adequate results. But it is far more 

 difficult to awaken any widespread concern on behalf of 

 those great abiding national interests which it is our 

 charge and heritage to defend. And yet there are signs 

 of no uncertainty which must to all thoughtful and 

 instructed minds, from many directions, suggest the 

 question whether that industrial leadership which has 

 hitherto made our small and crowded country the 

 world's workshop, and almost the world's mart, is 

 not slipping from us. This is a question not of 

 more or less wealth or luxury, but of very livelihood to 

 the masses of the people under the special conditions of 

 our national existence. If work ceases to come to a 

 workshop, there is nothing for it but prompt dispersal of 

 the workmen. All authorities seem agreed that the popu- 

 lation of five or six millions inhabiting England and 

 Wales in the time of Queen Elizabeth represents pretty 

 nearly what their areas can sustain as agricultural, self- 

 supporting countries. But the population of England and 

 Wales alone was shown by the census of 1881 to have 

 reached nearly twenty-six millions. So that seven years 

 ago there was in the southern half of Great Britain an 

 excess of twenty millions above what the country 

 could reasonably support, except as a community of 

 artificers and traders, and general carriers, by im- 

 jort and export, of the world's merchandise. It 

 leeds only a glance into past history to see that this, 

 yhile an enviable position for a nation while prosperity 

 ists, is practical extinction when the channels of com- 

 lerce are turned, or lost advantages have transferred pro- 

 luction to new centres. Macaulay's fancy picture of the 

 few Zealander sketching the ruins of St. Paul's from the 

 broken arches of London Bridge seems of very little con- 

 cern to the present citizen, whose ears are deafened with 

 the ceaseless roar and traffic of the streets. And yet pre- 

 cisely that doom of silence and decay has befallen many 

 a proud mother-city of which now " even the ruins have 

 perished." It would far exceed present limits to show in 

 detail how many articles of our own immemorial pro- 

 duction we ourselves now largely import, because 

 the foreign workman produces them better, or produces 

 them at less cost. The evidence will be fresh in the 

 recollection of the readers of this journal. Neither 

 can they fail to recall with what persistence we have 

 pointed out the remedy. There is but one real remedy : 

 the better training of the workman ; and — if we may 

 be allowed to say it — of his employer too. Everyone 

 who, without prejudice, has opportunity to watch a fair 

 specimen of the British workman at his work must admit 

 that the raw material is as good as ever it was ; that in the 

 quantity and quality of the work he can turn out in a 

 given time, few of any nationality can equal, and none 

 Vol. xxxviii.— No. 969. 



surpass him. But in the training he receives, and in the 

 opportunities of his receiving it, there is much left to be 

 desired. And, meantime, there is not only the grave 

 fear, but, in many branches of industry, the accom- 

 plished fact, that other nations may and do outstrip 

 us in the race. 



Perhaps there is some belated merit in seeing that 

 now ; but all honour to those who, with heart and 

 means to labour towards the better training of our 

 artisans, devoted themselves to the endeavour when the 

 need for it was less comparatively obvious. Honour 

 especially to one man, Mr. Quintin Hogg, who, close upon 

 a quarter of a century ago, at an age when most young 

 men are concentrating their best energies on cricket, or 

 football, or lawn tennis (all good things in their way), 

 made it his life's task to raise the skilled workman of 

 London, and furnish him more fully for his labour, for his 

 own sake and for ours. Probably most of our readers know 

 how that small enterprise has become a great one indeed, 

 with the old Polytechnic for its present home and centre, 

 and with a fuller variety of classes and branches, and 

 with a greater comprehensiveness of scheme, than we 

 can now attempt to describe. But all has hitherto 

 rested on the shoulders, and been sustained by the 

 purse, of Mr. Hogg himself, who, during the past six 

 years, has spent, speaking broadly, some £100,000 in 

 establishing and sustaining these admirable schools. But 

 the time has now come when so great a burden, for the 

 work's sake as well as for his own, should no longer 

 depend upon the means and life of a single man ; and 

 there is now an opportunity of securing for the Institute 

 something like an adequate endowment. The Charity 

 Commissioners have offered to endow it with ,£2500 per 

 annum on condition that the public find .£35,000 as a 

 supplementary fund. £18,000 have already been promised 

 by the personal friends of the founder ; but £17,000 still 

 remain to be raised — a large sum no doubt, but a small 

 one compared to our still unrivalled resources, and the 

 national value of the Institute, not only for its own im- 

 mediate results, but as a model for similar efforts in all 

 the great centres of our industry. Those who believe in 

 science— that is, in faithfully accurate and exact know- 

 ledge — as the only sure basis for any national prosperity 

 that is to bear the stress of the fierce competition of our 

 times, are earnestly invited to make themselves ac- 

 quainted with the work of the Institute, and to con- 

 tribute to its funds. | Eighty-one thousand members 

 and students have joined since it was moved to the Poly- 

 technic, 309 Regent Street, in 1882. All donations or 

 subscriptions will be thankfully received there, or by Mr. 

 Quintin Hogg, 3 Cavendish Square, W. 



THE GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION OF 

 THE FAMILY CHARADRIID<E. 



The Geographical Distribution of the Family Chara- 

 driidce ; or the Plovers, Sandpipers, Snipes, and their 

 Allies. By Henry Seebohm. (London : H, Sotheran 

 and Co., 1888.) 



THIS is a handsome volume of more than 500 pages, 

 and it is illustrated by twenty-one coloured plates, 

 drawn in Mr. Keuleman's best style. Mr. Seebohm has 

 eschewed giving much information as to the habits of 



E 



