340 



NATURE 



[Aug, 26, 1875 



later years the supply was increased by the construction of five 

 more aqueducts. Three of the old aqueducts have sufficed to 

 supply the wants of the city in modern times. These aqueducts 

 of Rome are to be numbered among her grandest engineering 

 works. ^ Time will not admit ot my saying anything about her 

 harbour works and b'idges, her basilicas and baths, and nume- 

 rous other works in Europe, in Asia, and in Africa. Not only 

 were these works executed in a substantial and perfect manner, 

 but they were maintained by an efficient staff of men divided 

 into bodies, each having their special duties to perform. The 

 highest officers of state superintended the construction of works, 

 were proud to have their names associated with them, and con- 

 structed extensive works at their own expense. 



Progress in Europe stopped with the fall of the Roman 

 Empire. In the fourth and succeeding centuries the barbarian 

 hordes of Western Asia, people who felt no want of roads and 

 bridge"!, swept over Europe to plunder and destroy. 



With th'i seventh century began the rise of the Mohammedan 

 power, and a partial return to conditions apparently more favour- 

 able to the progress of industrial art, when widespread lands 

 were again united under the sway of powerful rulers.* Science 

 owes much to Arab scholars, who kept and handed on to us the 

 knowledge acquired so slowly in ancient times, and much of 

 which would have been lost but for them. Still, few useful 

 works remain to mark the supremacy of the Mohammedan 

 power at all comparable to those of the age which preceded its 

 rise. 



A great building age h^gvn ia Europe in the tenth century, 

 and lasted through the thirteenth. It v/as during this period that 

 these great ecclesiastical buildings were erected, which are not 

 more remarkable for artistic excellence than for boldness in 

 design. 



While the building of cathedrals progressed on all sides in 

 Europe, works of a utilitarian character, which concern the 

 engineer, did not receive such encouragement, excepting perhaps 

 in Italy. 



From the twelfth to the thirteenth centuries, with the revival 

 of the arts and sciences in the Italian republics, many im- 

 portant works were undertaken for the improvement of thi; 

 rivers and harbours of Italy. In 148 1 canal locks were first used ; 

 and some of the earliest of which we have record were erected 

 by Leonardo da Vinci, who would be remembered as a skilful 

 engineer had he not left other greater and more attractive works 

 to claim the homage of posterity. 



The great use that has since been made of this simple means 

 of transferring floating vessels from one water level to another, 

 in connection not only with inland navigation, but in all the 

 great ports and harbours of the world, renders it all themore 

 deservmg of remark. 



In India, under the Moguls, irrigation works, for which they 

 had a natural aptitude, were carried on during these centuries 

 with vigour, and more than one emperor is noted for the nume- 

 rous great works of this nature which he carried out. If the native 

 records can be trusted, the number of hydraulic works undertaken 

 by some rulers is surprising. Tradition relates that one king 

 who reigned in Orissa in the twelfth century made one million 

 tanks or reservoirs, besides building sixty temples, and erecting 

 numerous other works. ^ ^ 



In India, the frequent overflow of the great rivers, and the 

 periodical droughts, which rendered irrigation necessary, led to 

 extensive protective works being undertaten at an early period ; 

 but as these works have been maintained by successive rulers, 

 Mogul and Mohammedan, until recent times, and have not been 

 left for our inspection, deserted and useless for 3,000 years or 

 more, as is often the case in Egvpt and Mesopotamia, there is 

 more difficulty in ascertaining the date of such works in India. 



Works of irrigation were among the earliest attempts at 

 engineering undertaken by the least civilised inhabitants in all 

 pans of the world. Even in Australia, where savages are found 

 as low as any in the scale of civilisation, traces of irrigation 

 works have been found ; these works, however, must be taken 

 to show that the natives were once somewhat more civilised than 

 we now find them. In Feejee, our new possession, the natives 

 occasionally irrigate their land,* and have executed a work of a 



I Total length 250 miles ; 50 on arches, 200 underground. 



^ '' Under the last of the house of Ommiyah (750 a.d.) one coaunand was 

 obeyed almost along the whole diameter of the known world, from the banks 

 of the Sihon to the utmost promontory of Portugal." — Hallam's " Middle 

 Ages," vol. ii. p. 120, 2nd edit 



^ K.ing Bhim Deo. a.d. 1174, 60 temples, 10 bridges, 40 wells stone cased, 

 152 landing stairs, and 1,000,000 tanks. — Hunter's " Orissa," vol. i. p. 100. 



* Erskine's "Western Pacific," p. 171. 



higher class, a canal some two miles long and sixty feet wide, to 

 shorten the distance passed over by their canoes.' The natives 

 of New Caledonia irrigate their fields with great skill.'^ In Peru, 

 the Incas excelled in irrigation as in other great and useful 

 works, and constructed most admirable underground conduits of 

 masonry for the purpose of increasing the fertility of the land.' 



It is frequently easier to lead water where it is wanted than to 

 check its irruption into places where its presence is an evil, often 

 a disaster. For centuries the existence of a large part of 

 Holland has been dependent on the skill of man. How soon he 

 began in that country to contest with the sea the possession of 

 the land we do not know, but early in the twelfth century dykes 

 were constructed to keep back the ocean. As the prosperity of 

 the country increased with the great extension of its commerce, 

 and land became more valuable and necessary for an increasing 

 population, very extensive works were undertaken. Land was 

 reclaimed from the sea, canals were cut, and machines were 

 designed for lifting water. To the practical knowledge acquired 

 by the Dutch, whose method of carrying out hydraulic works is 

 original and of native growth, much of the knowledge of the 

 present day in embanking, and draining, and canal making is 

 due. The North Holland Canal * was the largest navigable 

 canal in existence until the Suez Canal was completed ; and the 

 Dutch have just now nearly finished making a sea canal from 

 Amsterdam to the North Sea, which, though not equal to the 

 Suez Canal in length, will be as great in width and depth, and 

 involves perhaps larger and more important works of art. This 

 country was for many years beholden to the Dutch for help in 

 carrying out hydraulic works. In the seventeenth century much 

 fen land in the eastern counties was drained by Dutch labour, 

 directed by Dutch engineers, among whom Sir Cornelius 

 Vermuyden, an old campaigner of the Thirty Years' War, and a 

 colonel of horse under Cromwell, is the most noted. 



While the Dutch were acquiring practical knowledge in dealing 

 with water, and we in Britain among others were benefiting by 

 their experience, the disastrous results which ensued from the 

 inundations caused by the Italian rivers of the Alps gave a new 

 importance to the science of hydraulics. Some of the greatest 

 philosophers of the seventeenth century — among them Torricelli, 

 a pupil of Galileo,^ — were called upon to advise and to super- 

 intend engineering works ; nor did they confine themselves to 

 the construction of preventive works, but thoroughly investigated 

 the condition pertaining to fluids at rest or in motion, and gave 

 to the world a valuable series of works on hydraulics and 

 hydraulic engineering, which form the basis of our knowledge of 

 these subjects at the present day. 



Some of the bes-t scientific works (prior to the nineteenth 

 century) on engineering subjects we owe to Italian and French 

 wrifer.s. The writings of Belidor, an officer of artillery in France 

 in the seventeenth century, who did not, however, confine him- 

 self to military subjects, drew attention to engineering questions. 

 Not long after their appearance, the Fonts et Chausees® were 

 established, which has maintained ever since a body of able men 

 specially educated for, and devoted to, the prosecution of indus 

 trial works. 



The impulse given to road-making in the early part of the 

 last century soon extended to canals and means fcr facilitating 

 locomotion and transport generally. Tramways were used in 

 connection with mines at least as early as the middle of the 

 seventeenth century, but the rails were, in those days, of wood. 

 The first iron rails are said to have been laid in this country as 

 early as 1738 ; after which time their use was gradually extended, 

 until It became "general in mining districts. 



By the beginning of this century the great ports of England 

 were connected by a system of canals ; and new harbour works 

 became necessary, and were provided to accommodate the 

 increase of commerce and trade, which improved means of 

 internal transport had rendered possible. It was in the con- 

 struction of these works that our own Brindley and Smeaton, 

 Telford and Rennie, and other engineers of their time, did so 

 much. 



But it was not until the steam-engine, improved and almost 

 created by the illustrious Watt, became such a potent instru- 

 ment, that engineering works to the extent they have since been 

 carried out became possible or necessary. It gave mankind no 



r Seeman, p. 82. 



^ Er.-kine'» " Western Pacific," p. 355. 



3 Markham's "Cieza" (note), p, 236. 



4 North Holland Canal, finished in 1825. 



5 Galileo, b. 1564 ; Torricelli, b. 160 i. 



6 Ponts et Chaussees, established 1720. 



