66 Influence of German Research. 



Oxford, speaking of his experience when a student at 

 Geissen, in Germany, states : " I say that the enthu- 

 siasm and earnestness of the young men in the labor- 

 atory was quite unparalleled in my experience at 

 Oxford. The dilettante sort of way in which things 

 go on there is very inferior indeed to the way the 

 German students study. At Heidelberg, I have been 

 told, there are about eighty professors, and amongst 

 those professors are some of the most eminent men in 

 Europe, so that they have a staff quite unsurpassed." 



The industry of the Germans in scientific research 

 is quite remarkable, they are availing themselves of 

 the great fountain of knowledge to a much greater 

 extent than ourselves, and are already beginning to 

 reap the reward. Within the last few years they have 

 succeeded, by means of researches, in making alizarine, 

 the colouring principle of madder. " England pro- 

 duces immense quantities of benzene, the greatest part 

 of which goes to Germany, there to be converted into 

 aniline dyes, a considerable quantity of which goes 

 back to England. No other country is so far advanced 

 in the manufacture of the coal-tar colours as Ger- 

 many. The quantity of alizarine manufactured by 

 the German makers far surpasses the English pro- 

 duction." (See "Alizarine, Natural and Artificial," 

 by F. Versmann, New York, 1873). Statements of 

 this kind are frequently published, and made by our 

 manufacturers and others, of the departure of branch 

 after branch of our manufactures to the Continent, and 

 of continually increasing importation of foreign-made 

 articles. 



