504 



NATURE 



[January 6, 191 6 



the deaths of Lord Kelvin, Lord Lister, and Lord 

 Avebury. There are six new Privy Councillors, 

 and three new members of the Privy Council in 

 Ireland ; and of the nine, all except one are, or 

 have been, members of the House of Commons, 

 including two Labour members. The total dis- 

 regard thus shown to the power which scientific men 

 can bring into the chief council of our Sovereign is 

 characteristic of the political mind which advises 

 his Majesty in the selection of men worthy of 

 the honour. The work of science is unknown to 

 political circles ; and the road to the Privy Council 

 is not through Burlington House or other centre^ 

 where scientific men add their contributions to 

 the store of knowledge by which alone can 

 national greatness be ensured, but through Par- 

 liament and the market-place, where distinction 

 is not gained by producing-power, but by per- 

 suasive rhetoric. 



From the national point of view, the Privy 

 Council should include many men of distinguished 

 eminence in pure and applied science, whereas, 

 now that Sir Henry Roscoe is dead, there is 

 not a member of the Council who can be specially 

 regarded as a representative of science. We sup- 

 pose that this accounts for the fact that the com- 

 mittee of the Council appointed to administer 

 the moneys voted by Parliament for the develop- 

 ment of scientific and industrial research does not 

 include a single man of science. Scientific and 

 industrial experts constitute a council to advise 

 the committee, but are naturally subordinate to 

 it. In a State which used true standards of value, 

 each of these experts would be a member of the 

 Privy Council instead of being under the control 

 of a committee which knows nothing whatever of 

 the technical difficulties to be faced. In this 

 country, under the pressure of public opinion, our 

 ministers appoint advisory committees of men of 

 science and engineers for war problems connected 

 with the Ministry of Munitions, Admiralty, the 

 Board of Trade, and other departments of State ; 

 but, whereas all the members of these committees 

 would have been made Privy Councillors in Ger- 

 many, not a single one is given the like honour 

 here. Yet the Times can refer to " an exceedingly 

 catholic selection of new Privy Councillors, 

 among whom Mr. Will Crooks is perhaps the 

 most notable and the nearest in accord with the 

 spirit of the time." 



We need not attach much importance to the 

 phrase used by our contemporary ; yet it is true 

 of the world bounded by the political horizon, 

 where votes count for more than genius. True 

 also it is, and characteristic of the spirit of the 

 NO. 2410, VOL. 96] 



time as embodied in the daily papers, that, so 

 far as we have seen, not a single reference has 

 been made to the almost complete absence of the 

 names of scientific men from the list of honours, 

 and the usual satisfaction has been expressed at 

 the selection. The indifference thus shown to 

 science, when all its resources are needed for the 

 successful prosecution of the war in which we 

 are engaged, and for the industrial conflict to 

 follow it, makes us wonder whether our statesmen 

 are capable of understanding what scientific work 

 means to a nation. We live in a scientific age, 

 yet we are governed by men who belong to a 

 century ago; and in their hands, unfortunately 

 for national dignity, lies the division of national 

 honours and emoluments. " Honour and glory 

 and power " are thus much easier won by engag- 

 ing in politics or commerce than by a career 

 devoted to science. All the benefits of modern 

 civilisation are due to the achievements of science 

 or inventions based upon them ; but neither the 

 multitude nor its masters in politics or industry 

 are familiar with the names of the men whose 

 work has provided the comforts and the strength 

 of the present day. While this condition of things 

 persists, science cannot reasonably hope that its 

 meritorious services to the State will receive en- 

 lightened attention or just reward. 



THE BRITISH COAL-TAR INDUSTRY. 

 The British Coal-Tar Industry: Its Origin, De- 

 velopment, and Decline. Edited by Prof. 

 W. M. Gardner. Pp. ix + 437. (London: Wil- 

 liams and Norgate, 1915.) Price 105. 6d. net. 

 IN this volume Prof, Gardner has collected a 

 series of lectures and addresses delivered on 

 the British coal-tar industry and allied subjects 

 during the last fifty years. These discourses fall 

 naturally into two categories, those delivered 

 before the war and those dealing with the problem 

 of the shortage of dyes arising from the war. 



The first three lectures of the earlier series are, 

 very appropriately, the Cantor Lectures of 1868 

 on the aniline or coal-tar colours by Sir William 

 Perkin, the discoverer of mauve or aniline purple, 

 the first synthetic dye. Successive discourses by 

 other lecturers at first indicated a satisfactory de- 

 velopment of the youthful industry in England 

 and France, but in 1881 a note of warning was 

 sounded by Sir Henry Roscoe, the subject being 

 indigo and its artificial production, when the lec- 

 turer pointed out that, while the raw materials of 

 the synthetic dye industry were produced in 

 England, the conversion of these crude substances 

 into finished and valuable colours was .very largely 



