June 2, 1892] 



NATURE 



III 



higher geographical teaching. In many respects the Americaii 

 Colleges are in advance of the corresponding institutions in this 

 country, and geography is attracting increased attention on the 

 part of some of the most energetic and progressive educationists. 



Count Pfeil, who recently passed through London, en route 

 for the Cape of Good Hope, is about to conduct a party of 

 emigrants to Walfisch Bay, in the hope of colonising the adjacent 

 parts of German South- West Africa. 



Two pillars, erected by Diogo Cab, the first Portuguese 

 explorer on the west coast of Africa, have recently been brought 

 back to Lisbon. An interesting circumstance is the discovery 

 on the pillar brought from Benguela of an inscription showing 

 that the coast had been traced so far in 1482, two years 

 earlier than the date usually assigned. 



THE IRON AND STEEL INSTITUTE. 

 T^HE annual meeting of this institution was held on Thursday 

 -^ and Friday of last week, at the Institution of Civil Engi- 

 neers, Sir Frederick Abel, the President, occupying the chair. 

 After the reading of the Council's annual report Sir Frederick 

 Abel delivered his Presidential address. He began with a 

 reference to the losses which the Institute had sustained 

 during the year by the death of some of its eminent 

 members. He spoke especially of the solid services rendered 

 to science by the late Duke of Devonshire. The Duke's wise 

 munificence in the establishment of the Cavendish Laboratory 

 in Cambridge University, and the important part he took in 

 the labours of the Royal Commission on scientific instruction 

 and the advancement of science, were described as "illustra- 

 tions of his active participation in a movement of most vital 

 importance to the maintenance of our position and influence 

 among nations." Sir Frederick also referred to the Duke's 

 ready consent to fill the post of first president of the Iron and 

 Steel Institute as a proof of his appreciation of the high im- 

 portance to be attached to the successful foundation of an 

 organization of which he predicted that it would prove "a 

 powerful instrument for the advancement and progress of the 

 iron and steel trade of Great Britain, by promoting intercourse 

 and interchange of knowledge between its members " — a pre- 

 diction which was speedily and amply fulfilled. In his intro- 

 ductory address the Duke had discussed the development of iron- 

 manufacture in most interesting and comprehensive fashion. 

 In referring to the most extraordinary mineral wealth of the 

 United States, he pointed out that although m 1867 the produc- 

 tion of pig iron in America had risen to nearly 1,350,000 tons 

 (of 2240 lbs.), the price of labour did not warrant the belief 

 that there was any immediate prospect of the United States 

 competing with the iron-producing countries of Europe in the 

 open markets of the world. 



Sir Frederick continued : — 



A very interesting report upon the state of iron manufacture 

 was presented by Sir Lowthian Bell to the British Association 

 at its meeting in Dundee in 1867. A critical examination was 

 made therein of the relative position of ourselves and Continental 

 nations as iron manufacturers, a p>-opos of the Paris International 

 Exhibition of that year ; but in the encouraging view which that 

 eminent authority presented of our position at the period nanied 

 he was not led to make any reference to the prominence which 

 the United States were beginning to assume among iron-pro- 

 ducing countries. After the lapse of twelve years, however, the 

 production of pig iron in the States had been doubled, while in 

 another ten years it had reached a figure approximating to the 

 average production in Great Britain during the past ten years. ^ 



Viewed from our present standpoint, the observations made 

 by our first President in his opening address of 1867, regarding 

 the development of the manufactureof steel, are very interesting. 

 The Duke pointed out that, "owing to recent inventions and 

 improvements, steel had acquired an importance greatly exceed- 

 ing that which it previously possessed." After referring to the 



' Mr. Robert S. M'Cormick, Resident Commissioner for Great Britain for 

 the Chicago Exhibition of 1893, in a paper recently communicated to the 

 Society of Arts upon the future trade-relations between Great Britain and 

 the United States, gives the following figures as demonstrating that the 

 British iron and steel industry has been outstripped in magnitude by that of 

 the United States. In i8jo the produce of pig iron in America was 9.202,703 

 tons against 7,875,130 tons in the United Kinjjdom ; of manufactured iron, 

 including rails. 2,820,377 tons were produced m America against 1,923,221 

 tons in Great Briuin, and, of Bessemer steel. 3 688,871 tons were Amencan 

 produce, while the production in the United Kingdom amounted 102,014,843 

 tons. 



then prevalent views regarding the nature of steel, and to its 

 production by the cementation process, the puddling and the 

 mixing processes, and the partial decarbonisation of cast iron by 

 blowing air into pig iron melted in a charcoal hearth, he dwelt 

 upon the interest with which the development of the Bessemer 

 process had been watched by the iron-making world, upon the 

 promise " which that process afforded of furnishing a supply of 

 steel suitable for many most important purposes upon a scale 

 and at a price hitherto unknown," and upon the association of 

 the names of Joseph Heath with the first employment of man- 

 ganese in steel manufacture, and of Robert Mushet with the 

 important part played by manganese-alloys in the development 

 of the Bessemer process. While the approaching expiration of 

 the first Bessemer patent was referred to as likely to tend to an 

 increase in the demand for its products, the limits which the 

 then existing knowledge placed upon the application of the pro- 

 cess were pointed out, and the advantages of the puddling pro- 

 cess dwelt upon. It is interesting to note that, at any rate in 

 Germany, these advantages have not yet been dispelled, in spite 

 of the great revolution which the Bessemer and open-hearth pro- 

 cesses have effected in the applications of wrought iron and 

 steel. On the other hand, the importance which steel had 

 acquired through the practical development of the Bessemer- 

 process, at the date of our first President's address, was but an 

 indication of the new era upon which the iron and steel indus- 

 tries were about to enter. In that year the produce of Bessemer- 

 steel in the United Kingdom was only 160,000 tons, while 

 open-hearth steel was not yet a staple product ; in 1890 the 

 British production of Bessemer steel exceeded two millions of 

 tons, while that of open-hearth steel exceeded i '5 millions of 

 tons.^ 



A statement made in the Duke's address of 1869, that, so far 

 as existing knowledge went, the Bessemer process was of 

 limited application, as only certain kinds of iron were susceptible 

 of successful treatment by it, affords, by a comparison with the 

 present condition of things, an interesting illustration of the con- 

 tinuous progress made in the successful application of advances 

 in scientific knowledge to practical purposes. The success 

 which crowned the efforts of Thomas, Gilchrist, Snelus, and 

 others to render the Bessemer- and open-hearth processes 

 efficient in their application to ores, the successful treatment of 

 which by them appeared well-nigh hopeless in the earlier days 

 of the Iron and Steel Institute's existence, has recently been 

 very prominently before the public, and the members will 

 certainly receive with special interest the communication which 

 the Director of Naval Construction has promised us on experi- 

 ments with basic steel. 



In the discussion which took place at the meeting of the 

 Institute of Naval Architects last year, a propos to a paper by 

 M. J. Barba on recent improvements in armour plates, it became 

 evident that the public were far better instructed as to progress 

 made in such directions as this by other nations than as to ad- 

 vances made by ourselves ; such information as Mr. White feels 

 warranted in affording us with respect to our progress in 

 practical experience on the merits of basic steel as applied to 

 shipbuilding and other naval purposes will therefore be very 

 welcome. 



From the United States interesting accounts have reached us 

 of a continuation of the experiments with armour plates \o\ 

 inches thick, which were commenced at Annapolis in September 

 1890, when an all-steel and a nickel-steel plate, from the 

 Creusot works, were contested in comparison with a compound 

 plate of Cammel's make. Of these, the nickel-steel plate was 

 considered to have shown itself somewhat superior to the all- 

 steel plate, and very decidedly superior to the compound plate ; 

 and it is stated that Congress showed its appreciation of the 

 importance of this result by appropriating a million dollars to 

 the purchase of nickel ore. The second and third series of trials 

 have been carried out at the Naval Ordnance Proof Ground at 

 Indian Island, near Washington. The plates fired at iii October 

 last, constituting the second series of three, are described as a 

 high carbon nickel-steel plate from the Bethlehem Iron 

 Company, one of low carbon nickel-steel from Carnegie, 

 Fhipps, and Co.'s works at Pittsburg, and a so-called 

 " Harveyised " plate of low carbon steel from the Bethlehem 

 works. The description given of the Harvey ising process 



« 1891 appears to have witnessed a very remarkable falling off in the pro- 

 duction of Bessemer steel, to the extent indeed of about 3.S per cent., while 

 the production of open-hearth steel exhibits a reduction in the past year of 

 only 3 per cent. 



NO. 1179, VOL. 46] 



