July 13, 1893] 



NATURE 



247 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



[ The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions ex- 

 pressed by his correspondents. Neither can he undertake 

 to return, or to correspond with the writers of, rejected 

 manuscripts intended for this or any other part of Nature. 

 No notice is taken of anonymous communications.'\ 



The Royal Society. 



The article on the Royal Society, published in Nature of 



June 8 by my friend Mr. Thiselton-Dyer, contains very little 



lalement of fact to which I, or any one acquainted with the 



islory and traditions of the Society.could wish lo take exception. 



It does, however, seem to me to be important to point out 



a ihirg Mr. Thiselton Dyer has omitted to do) that the ten- 



icncy of the development of ihe Society has been to restrict its 



irdinaiy membership to those who have done valuable work in 



" the improvement of natural knowledge " either by the exer- 



ise of their own mental gifts, or by assisting in some marked 



Asy — by the wise application of money or other direct influence 



—the tfibrts of others to that end. When, some thirty-five years 



igo, the annual number of elections of ordinary Fellows was 



;iraclically restricted to fifteen by the limitation to that number 



if the list recommended by the Council, the chance of admission 



1 the Society for "a member of the legislature with the keenest 



ympn.thy for science" (to quote Mr. Thiselton-Dyer's words) 



ecanie small ; and as the years rolled on, and the number of 



rious workers in science increased in unexpected proportion, it 

 It. came less and less. Accordingly, not many years ago, it wasde- 

 crmined by the Society, in order to meet this undesirable state 

 of things, that members of the Privy Council should be eligilile 

 at any time as Fellows of the Society without reference to the 

 nnual list of fifteen prepared by the Council. Apparently the 

 Mtention of this measure was to relieve the ordinary annual list 

 u( fifteen candidates for Fellowship from the presence of a cer- 

 tain number of members of the legislature with keen sympathy 

 for science, and other such aspirants, and to reserve it for those 

 for whom it could be claimed that they had done something 

 tangible for "the improvement of natural knowledge." It 

 seems to me that the selections made by the Council since that 

 date confirm this view. Mr. Thiselton-Dyer makes a mistake 

 in confounding the real services to natural knowledge rendered 

 by Sir John Kiik, Sir George Naes, and Sir Charles Warren, 

 with ihe "sympathy for icience" of amiable members of Par- 

 liament. 



There is another aspect of the question recently discussed 

 which seems to me to be important. Does the Royal Society 

 propose, or does it not, to include in its annual elections persons 

 emintnt in historical study? If it does, surely Freeman, 

 Stubhs and Gardiner would have been Fellows of the 

 Society. The examination and exposition of documents when 

 they relate to an Asiatic race cannot be regarded as more akin 

 to the investigations of the improvers ol natural knowledge 

 than is the study of ihe inscriptions, camps, and pottery of 

 European peoples. Does the Koyal Society explicitly or im- 

 plicitly recognise claims which would give their possessor a 

 first place in an Academyof Inscriptionsorof Hi.stoiical Science? 

 I should venture lo nply lo this question : "Certainly not ; by 

 most definitely expressed inttntion iuch studies as those of the 

 historian were excluded by the founders of the Society from 

 their scope. And further, were such studies to be embraced by 

 the Society as a new departure, it would be necessary to make 

 special provision for them by increasing the annual number of 

 elections, and by securing seals on the Council for one or two 

 persons acquainted with those studies and the merits of those 

 who pur.ue them." 



I believe that the Royal Society is honoured and trusted 

 by the British public as being the leading society "for the 

 improvement of natural knowledge.'' lis original and de- 

 liberately chosen motto, " NulTus in verba" ii a distinct 

 irofession of its purpose to appeal to experiment and the 

 observation of phenomena, rather than to encourage the dis- 

 |iiisitions of the bookman and compiler of history. 



Though it may well be urged that such a liody as "the 

 Royal Society for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge " 

 is wise in offering a kind of honorary membership on special 

 terms to those who are a power in the Stale, there seems 

 o be no ground for maintaining ihat the Felloivs (as .Mr. 

 I'hiselton-Djer declares) "display them elves as reasonable, 

 if hard-headed, men of the world" when they sacritice one of 



NO. 1237, VOL. 48] 



their fifteen ordinary annual fellowships for the purpose of 

 enrolling among their number an isolated example of the 

 numerous body of historians and essayists who have att.iined 

 some distinction in subjects and methods remote from those 

 professedly pursued by the Society.' 



Were the Royal Academy of Arts to assign one of its As- 

 sociateships to, let us say, a distinguished botanist who is known 

 to have a keen sjmpathy for Art, the world would, I venture to 

 maintain, consider that the Academicians had not " brought 

 themselves into touch with another field of national life," nor 

 " displayed themselves as reasonable or hard-headed men of the 

 world," but had simply stultified themselves whilst conferring 

 no real honour upon their nominee. The Royal Ac.idemy in- 

 cludes a small number of laymen as honorary members, but it is 

 recognised that the Academicians shall only confer their regular 

 membership upon those of whose work they are competent 

 judges, and consequently upon those who are really honoured by 

 the selection, namely, artists. 



It seems to me that tnutalis mutandis much the same is true 

 of the Royal Society. The Society has gained in the pasi, and 

 will retain in the future, public esteem, and increasing oppor- 

 tunities for usefulness by aiming with singleness of purpose at 

 "the improvement of natural knoivledge." To confer honour on 

 those who have improved natural knowledge is its privilege and 

 its duty. The appreciation of historians and of " sympailietic 

 legislators" is a function which the Society is incapable ol per- 

 forming, and moi cover one which few, if any, persons desire it 

 to attempt, since it must lose dignity by assuming to adjudicate 

 in matters in which it is incompetent. 



Oxford, June 26. E. Ray Lankestlr. 



Although my fiiend Prof. Lankester finds that the 

 " tendency of the development " of the Royal Society has been 

 to restrict the area from which its members are selectid — a 

 conclusion in which I am not disposed to agree— I do not find 

 that he seriously impugns the account which 1 attempted to give 

 of what appeared to me to be the traditional practice of the 

 Society in the matter. 



In fact in one respect he goes much further than I should 

 myself be inclined to do in admitting as a qualification for 

 men.bership "the wise application of money." I must confess 

 that I should be disposed to regard this, for obvious reasons, 

 with very close scrutiny. 



Apart, however, from this it is evident that Prof. Lankester 

 and those who agree with him would like to make the Royal 

 Society much more professionally scientific (for there are very 

 few scientific men nowadays who are not in some sort or other 

 professional). If they succeed I am disposed lo think that it 

 would be a very much less influential body than it is at present. 

 And I find that no inconsiderable body of the existing Fellows 

 are of the same opinion. W. T. Thiselton-Dyek, 



Kew, July i. 



Ice as an Excavator of Lakes and a Transporter of 

 Boulders. 



I HAVE devoted a considerable space in awoik I have rec ntly 

 published in which I have criticised the extreme glacial views of 

 some writers to an issue which underlies a great deal of their 

 reasoning, and which, it seems to me, it is absolutely necessary 

 we should determine liefore we are entitled to make the deduc- 

 tions habitually made by them. 



Before a geologist is jus'ified in making gigantic demands 

 upon the capacity and the power of ice as an excavator or as a 

 distributor of erratics and other debris over level plains it is 

 essential that he should first ascertain whether it is cap.ible of 

 the postulated woik or not. It is not science, it is a reversion 

 to scholasticism to invole ice as the cause of certain phenomena 

 unless and until we have justified the nppeal by showing that it 

 is competent to do the work demanded from it. This pre- 

 liminary step is not a geological one at all. It is a question of 

 physics, and must be determined by the same methods and the 

 same processes as other physical questions. So far as we know 

 the mechanical work done by ice is limited to one process. The 

 ice of which glaciers are formed is shod with boulders and with 

 pieces of rock which have fallen down their crevasses. These 



'I have addrt Sled my remarks mainly to the contentions of Mr. Dyer's 

 article. I should wish to avoid discussing the merits of .1 par'icular election 

 which in my opinion cannot now and never could legitiinately be a subject 

 for public comment. I wish, however, to state that 1 am not unacquainted 

 with the interesting essays on the history of geological theory which we owe 

 to tile hero of that election. 



