I INTRODUCTION. vii 



We have advanced to our present position in the scale 

 of nations by the efforts of a few chosen minds. Every 

 branch of human industry has been benefited by the 

 discoveries of science. The discoverers are therefore 

 deserving of that hero-worship which, sooner or later, 



Kthey receive from all. 

 The following pages are intended to convey to the 

 general reader a brief but correct account of the illustrious 

 dead, whose names are for ever associated with one of the 

 most brilliant eras in British science. It will be remem- 



E^red that, in the earliest years of the present century, 

 e world witnessed the control and application of steam 

 r Watt, Symington and Trevithick ; the great disco- 

 ries in physics and chemistry by Dalton, Cavendish, 

 Wollaston and Davy, in astronomy by Herschel, Mas- 

 kelyiie and Baily; the inventions of the spinning-mule 

 and power-loom by Crompton and Cartwright ; the in- 

 troduction of machinery into the manufacture of paper, 

 by Bryan Donkin and others ; the improvements in the 

 printing-press, and invention of stereotype printing, by 

 Charles Earl Stanhope ; the discovery of vaccination by 

 Jenner ; the introduction of gas into general use by 

 Murdock; and the construction (in a great measure) of 

 the present system of canal communication by Jessop, 

 Chapman, Telford and E-ennie. During the same period 

 f time were likewise living Count Rumford ; Robert 

 rown, the botanist; William Smith, "The Father of 

 glish Geology;" Thomas Young, the natural philo- 

 pher ; Brunei ; Bentham ; Maudslay ; and Francis Ro- 

 alds, who, by securing perfect insulation, was the first 

 demonstrate the practicability of passing an electric 



