446 



NA TURE 



[Sept. 6, 1888 



engineer who has successfully grappled with a problem such as 

 this? 



Another instance : the mouth of a broad river, or, more pro- 

 perly speaking, the inlet of the sea, has to be crossed at such a 

 level as not to impede the passage of the largest ships. Except 

 in one or two places the depth is profound, so that multiple 

 foundations for supporting a bridge become commercially im- 

 possible, and the solution of the problem must be found by 

 making, high in the air, a flight of span previously deemed 

 unattainable. Is there no poetry here? Again, although the 

 results do not strike the eye in the same manner, is there nothing 

 of poetry in the work that has to be thought out and achieved 

 when a wide river or an ocean channel has to be crossed by a 

 subterranean passage ? Works of great magnitude of this char- 

 acter have been performed with success, and to the benefit of 

 those for whose use they were intended. One of the greatest 

 and most noble of such works, encouraged, in years gone by, by 

 the Governments of our own country and of France, has lately 

 fallen into disfavour with an unreasoning public, who have not 

 taken the pains to ascertain the true state of the case. 



Surely it will be agreed that the promotion of ready intercourse 

 and communication between nations constitutes the very best and 

 most satisfactory guarantee for the preservation of peace : when 

 the peoples of two countries come to know each other intimately, 

 and when they, therefore, enter into closer business relations, 

 they are less liable to be led away by panic or by anger, and 

 they hesitate to go to war the one with the other. It is in the 

 interests of both that questions of difference which may arise 

 between them should be amicably settled, and having an intimate 

 knowledge of each other, they are less liable to misunderstand, 

 and the mode of determination of their differences is more 

 readily arranged. • Remember, the means of ready intercourse 

 and of communication, and the means of easy travel, are all due 

 to the application of science by the engineer. Is not therefore 

 his profession a beneficent one ? 



Further, do you not think poetical feeling will be excited in 

 the breast of that engineer who will in the near future solve the 

 problem (and it certainly will be solved when a sufficiently li^ht 

 motor is obtained) of travelling in the air — whether this solution 

 be effected by enabling the self-suspended balloon to be 

 propelled and directed, or perhaps, belter still, by enabling 

 not only the propulsion to be effected and the direction to be 

 controlled, but by enabling the suspension in the air itself to be 

 attained by mechanical means ? 



Tale other functions of the civil engineer— functions which, 

 after all, are of the most important character, for they contribute 

 directly to the prevention of disease, and thereby not only pro- 

 long life, but do that which is probably more important — afford 

 to the population a healthier life while lived. 



In one town, about which I have full means of knowing, the 

 report has just been made that in the year following the comple- 

 tion of a comprehensive system of sewerage, the deaths from 

 zymotic diseases had fallen from a total of 740 per annum to a 

 total of 372— practically one-half. Has the engineer no inward 

 satisfaction who knows such results as these have accrued from 

 his work ? 



Again, consider the magnitude and completeness of the water- 

 supply of a large town, especially a town that has to depend 

 upon the storing up of rain water : the prevision which takes 

 into account, not merely the variation of the different reasons of 

 the year, but the variation of one year from another ; that, having 

 collated all the stored-up information, determines what must be 

 the magnitude of the reservoirs to allow for at least three con- 

 secutive dry years, such as may happen ; and that finds the sites 

 where these huge reservoirs may be safely built. 



All the.-e — and many other illustrations which I could put 

 before you if time allowed — appear to me to afford conclusive 

 evidence that, whether it be in the erection of the lighthouse on 

 the lonely rock at sea ; whether it be in the crossing of rivers, or 

 seas, or arms of seas, by bridges or by tunnels ; whether it be 

 the cleansing of our towns from that which is foul ; whether it be 

 the supply of pure water to every dwelling, or the distribution of 

 light or of motive power ; or whether it be in the production of 

 the m'ghty ocean steamer, or in the spanning of valleys, the 

 piercing of mountains, and affording the firm, secure road for the 

 express train ; or whether it be the encircling of the world with 

 telegraphs — the work of the civil engineer is not of the earth 

 earthy, is not mechanical to the exclusion of science, is not 

 unintellectual ; but is of a most beneficent nature, is consistent 

 with true poetical feeling, and is worthy of the highest order of 

 intellect. 



SECTION A. 



MATHEMATICAL AND PHYSICAL SCIENCE. 



Opening Address by Prof. G. F. Fitzgerald, M.A., 

 F.R.S., President of the Section. 



The British Association in Bath, and especially we here in 

 Section A, have to deplore a very great loss. We confidently 

 anticipated profit and pleasure from the presence in this chair of 

 one of the leading spirits of English science, Dr. Schuster. We 

 deplore the loss, and we deplore the cause of it. It is always 

 sad when want of strength makes the independent dependent, 

 and it is doubly sad when a life's work is thereby delayed ; and 

 to selfish humanity it is trebly sad when, as in this case, we 

 ourselves are involved in the loss. And our loss is great. Dr. 

 Schuster has been investigating some very important questions. 

 He has been studying electric discharges in gases, and he has 

 been investigating the probably allied question of the variations 

 of terrestrial magnetism. We anticipated his matured pro- 

 nouncements upon these subjects, and also the advantage of his 

 very wide general information upon physical questions, and the 

 benefit of his judicial mind while presiding here. 



As to myself, his substitute, I cannot express how much 

 gratified I feel at the distinguished honour done me in asking 

 me to preside. It has been one of the ambitions of my life to 

 be worthy of it, and I will do my best to deserve your con- 

 fidence ; man can do no more, and upon such a subject "the 

 less said the soonest mended." 



I suppose most former occupants of this chair have looked 

 over the addresses of their predecessors to see what sort of a 

 thing was expected from them. I find that very few had the 

 courage to deliver no address. Most have devoted themselves 

 to broad general questions, such as the relations of mathematics 

 to physics, or more generally deductive to inductive science. 

 On the other hand, several have dealt each with his own 

 specialty. On looking back over these addresses my attention 

 was specially arrested by the first two pa^-t Presidents of this 

 Section whose bodily presence we cannot have here. They 

 were Presidents of Section A in consecutive years. In 1874, 

 Provost Jellett occupied this chair ; and in 1875, Prof. Balfour 

 Stewart occupied it. Foth have gone from us since the last 

 meeting of this Association. Each gave a characteristic 

 address. The Provost, with the clearness and brilliancy that 

 distinguished his great intellect, plunged through the deep and 

 broad questions surrounding the mechanism of the universe, 

 and with impassioned earnestness claimed on behalf of science 

 the right to prosecute its investigations until it attains, if it ever 

 does attain, to a mechanical explanation of all things. This 

 intrepid honesty, to carry to their utmost the principles of 

 whose truth he was convinced, the utter abhorrence of the 

 shadow of double-dealing with truth, was eminently character- 

 istic of one whom all, but especially we of Trinity College, 

 Dublin, will long miss as a lofty example of the highest 

 intellectual keenness and honesty, and mourn as the truest- 

 hearted friend, full of sympathy and Chri.-tian charity. In 

 1875, Prof. Stewart gave us a striking example of the other class 

 of address in a splendid exposition of the subject he did so much 

 to advance — namely, solar physics. He brought together from 

 the two great storehouses of his information and speculation a 

 brilliant store, and displayed them here for the advancement of 

 science. Him, too, all science mourns. Though, from want of 

 personal acquaintance, I am unequal to the task of bringing 

 before you his many abilities and great character, you can each 

 compose a fitting epitaph for this well-known great one of British 

 science. In this connection I am only expressing what we all 

 feel when I say how well timed was the Royal bounty recently 

 extended to his widow. At the same time, the niggardly re- 

 cognition of science by the public is a disgrace to the enlighten- 

 ment of the nineteenth century. What Chancellor or General 

 with his tens of thousands has done that for his country and 

 mankind that Faraday, Darwin, and Pasteur have done? The 

 "public" now are but the children of those who murdered 

 Socrates, tolerated the persecution of Galileo, and deserted 

 Columbus. 



In a Presidential address on the borderlands of the known 

 delivered from this chair the great Clerk Maxwell spoke of it as 

 an undecided question whether electro-magnetic phenomena are 

 due to a direct action at a distance or are due to the action of an 

 intevening medium. The year 1888 will be ever memorable as 

 the year in which this great question has been experimentally de- 

 cided by Hertz in Germany, and, I hope, by others in England. 



