;o8 



NATURE 



{Aug. 19, 1875 



of the experimental sciences, and as there are no public 

 laboratories available for the researches of private investi- 

 gators, it may be said that in many branches of experi- 

 mental science the State affords no permanent material 

 aid to such investigators." 



Assistance of a permanent description is also afforded 

 to learned societies, by providing them with apartments 

 free of rent, or with annual grants of money in lieu of such 

 accommodation : the sum of 500/. granted annually to the 

 Royal Geographical Society under certain conditions is 

 an instance of such a grant. 



We may regard as a permanent aid to science the 

 grant of 1,000/, for researches carried on by private indi- 

 viduals, which is annually voted by Parliament, and ad- 

 ministered by a Committee of the Royal Society. 



The first proposal for such a grant was contained in a 

 letter (dated October 24th, 1849) from Earl Russell then 

 (Lord John Russell) to the then President of the Royal 

 Society (the Earl of Rosse), and was to the following 

 effect :— 



" As there are from time to time scientific discoveries 

 and researches which cost money and assistance the 

 students of science can often but ill afford, I am induced 

 to consult your lordship, as President of the Royal 

 Society, on the following suggestion : — 



" I propose that at the close of the year the President 

 and Council should point out to the First Lord of the 

 Treasury a limited number of persons to whom the grant 

 of a reward, or of a sum to defray the cost of experiments, 

 might be of essential service. The whole sum which I 

 could recommend the Crown to grant in the present year 

 is 1,000/., nor can I be certain that my successor would 

 follow the same course ; but I should wish to learn 

 whether, in your lordship's opinion and that of your 

 colleagues, the cause of science would be promoted by 

 such grants." 



Lord Rosse, in reply to the proposal made by Lord J. 

 Russell, expressed his personal opinion that the judicious 

 employment of grants in the way proposed " would very 

 materially promote the advancement of science ;" and of 

 the two alternatives, namely, expending the 1,000/. in 

 rewards, or appropriating it to the payment of the ex- 

 penses of experiments, he preferred the latter, indicating 

 his reasons as follows : — 



" There are often details to be worked out before it is 

 possible to employ usefully newly discovered principles. 

 In many of the sciences reductions are required before 

 observations can be made use of. Both in science and 

 art, facts technically called constants are the materials of 

 discovery ; to determine them accurately is of great im- 

 portance. Now in all these cases, and in many others, 

 the work to be done is laborious and expensive, and as it 

 adds but little comparatively to the fame of tiie indivi- 

 dual, it especially requires encouragement." 



With regard to this " Government grant " Sir Edward 

 Sabine in his evidence says :...*'! suppose that 

 the 1,000/. in one year was designed as an experiment to 

 try the matter in the first instance. I always understood 

 that Lord Russell contemplated that the sum would be 

 augmented if the plan were found to work well." 



No change however has been made either in the 

 amount of the grant or in its mode of distribution since 

 its first establishment. 



As examples of the second — occasional — kind of aid, 

 expeditions for special researches, outfits of ships, and 

 apparatus and grants of money for such researches, are 



mentioned. Great as is the value of these contributions, 

 the Commissioners pointedly remark that " they do not 

 appear to be granted or refused on any sufficiently well- 

 defined principle." 



The lesson, indeed, which crops up throughout the in- 

 valuable investigations of this Commission, is that there is 

 a total want of system in almost all that we do, as a 

 nation, towards advancing scientific research. 

 (Z'tf be continued.^ 



THE ENCYCLOPEDIA BRITANNICA 

 The Encyclopadia Britannic a j a Dictionary of Arts, 

 Sciences^ and General Literature. Ninth Edition. 

 Vol. IL, Ana to Ath. (Edinburgh: Adam and 

 Charles Black, 1875.) 



IN reviewing the first volume] of this new edition of the 

 " Encyclopaedia " (Nature, vol. xi. p. 343), we were 

 obliged, by want of space, to omit more than the 

 briefest possible remarks upon the general plan of the 

 work. The conspicuous and increasing success of the 

 work is apparently a sufficient answer to those who would 

 find fault with the form of arrangement peculiar to this 

 " EncyclopaDdia." Among the considerable number of 

 Cyclopcedias which have been produced in Great Britain 

 during the last hundred years, this one, almost alone, has 

 been reproduced in a number of successive editions, 

 growing in excellence and reputation, and many people 

 might take this fact to be a sufficient proof that it is well 

 designed to meet a^ general want. But this success must 

 surely be due in great degree to the eminence of the con- 

 tributors, to the skill of the editors, or to any circumstance 

 rather than the scheme of the work. 



We have always been unable to comprehend the 

 exact raison d'etre of a cyclopaedia which is neither 

 strictly alphabetical nor strictly systematic. The " Bri- 

 tannica " may be compared to a soHd body of pudding 

 with plums in the form of excellent treatises disposed 

 here and there. Now we entirely fail to perceive any 

 convenience in this mode of construction. That it is 

 not very suitable for the purpose of simple reference 

 seems to be proved by the need of a full index to the 

 whole of the volumes. Nor, if a person wishes to use one 

 of the articles for careful continuous study in the manner 

 of a text-book, is it convenient to have it embedded in a 

 very heavy quarto volume, one of a large and costly series. 

 Many valuable and highly useful treatises are in fact 

 buried in this " Encyclopaedia," and are hardly available 

 for purposes of general reading. That this is so has 

 been confessed by the separate publication of some of the 

 principal treatises in former editions ; those, for instance, 

 by Sir John Herschel on " Physical Geography," and on 

 " Meteorology." 



Cyclopaedias have varied in form from the purely 

 alphabetical ones, best represented j.now in " Chambers' 

 Cyclopaedia," which approximates to the character of a 

 dictionary, to " Lardner's Cyclopasdia," in which each 

 subject was treated in a distinct and handy volume. 

 Coleridge tried to combine the two principles in the 

 *' Encyclopaedia Metropolitana," in which all sciences and 

 branches of knowledge were to be expounded in a series 

 of elaborate treatises, arranged according to logical 

 method, while an alphabetical dictionary of reference 



