April 4, 1895 J 



NATURE 



535 



Mond, F.R.S.,C. O'SuUivan, F.R.S.,and Prof. W. C. Roberts- 

 Austen, C. B., F.R.S. Secretaries, J. Millar Thomson, and 

 Wyndham Dunstan, K. R.S. Foreign Secretary, Prof. Raphael 

 Meldola, F.R.S. Treasurer, Dr. T. E. Thorpe, F.R.S. 

 Council, 'Dr. P. Phillips Bedson, Bennett Hooper Brough, 

 Prof. Harold Dixon, F.lv.S., Dr. Bernard Dyer, R. J. Friswell, 

 OltoHehner, Dr. F. Stanley Kipping, Herbert McLeod, F.R.S., 

 W. \. Shenstone. Ur. Thomas Stevenson, Dr. W. P. Wynne, 

 and Prof. Sydney Young, F. R. S. 



Prof. Armstrong, F'.R.S., the retiring President, de- 

 livered his address, in which he gave an account of the 

 ■work of the Society during the past year. The Faraday 

 Medal was presented to Lord Rayleigh for the distin- 

 guished services he has rendered to chemical science 

 through the discovery of argon. Lord Rayleigh re- 

 sponded in a lt.vi words, sharing the honour bestowed 

 on him with Prof. Ramsay. The President then called 

 on Prof. Ramsay, who laid before the Society an account 

 of the discovery of Helium in CiLveite, and on Mr. 

 Crookes, who described it spectroscopically. (These two 

 communications will be found in another column.) In 

 the evening the Fellows and their guests dined together 

 at the Hotel Metropole. Among those present were : — 



Dr. H. E. Aimstrong, the Right Hon. Jas. Bryce, M.P., 

 President of the Board of Trade ; the Right Hon. A. J. Balfour, 

 M.P., Sir Henry Roicoe, M.P., Mr. A. Vernon Harcouit, Lord 

 Rayleigh, Sir Waller Pndcaux, Clerk of the Goldsmiins' Com- 

 pany ;"Dr. W. J. Russell, Mr. T. F. Blackwell, Master of the 

 Salters' Company ; Prof. Odling, Sir Owen Roberts, Mr. 

 Carteighe, Mr. Layers Smith, Dr. W. H. Perkin, Prof. Thorpe, 

 Dr. J. H. Gladstone, Mr. W. Crookes. Dr. Stevenson, Mr. C. 

 K. Groves, Prof. McLeod, Prof. Percy Frankland, Prof. Riicker, 

 Prof. Dunstan, Dr. Atkinson, Prof. Ramsay, Prof. Emerson 

 Reynolds, Prof. Dewar, .Sir H. Gilbert, Prof. Smithells, Prof. 

 Tilden, Dr. Wynne, Mr. Alex. .Siemens, Prof. Thomson, Mr. 

 Thisellon-Dyer, Dr. Hugo Miiller, Mr. Norman Lockyer, Sir 

 P. Magnus, Prof. Meldola, Dr. W. PL Symons. 



A full report of the speeches made at the dinner 

 appeared in the Times of the following day, and we are 

 indebted to it for the following extracts : — 



In proposing the toast of the Houses of Parliament, the 

 President, Dr. H. E. Armstrong, remarked with reference to 

 argon, that the discovery which Lord Rayleigh and Prof. Ram- 

 say had made was not a chance discovery, but was the out- 

 come of twelve years of hard work on the part of Lord Rayleigh 

 in pursuit of the fourth decimal. The interest in the newly- 

 discovered argon would undoubtedly be an abiding one, and it 

 was believed that its development would be one of the most 

 extraordinary di.-coveries that had been made in our time. He 

 also referred to the discovery of Helium by Mr. Norman 

 Lockyer, and its recent identification by Prof. Ramsay and 

 Mr. Crookes. 



Mr. Bryce, in responding to the toast, said : Physical science, 

 and particularly chemical science, very frequently came in con- 

 tact with the work of the administrators of the Government, and 

 hardly a day passed by when they were not connected in some 

 way with electricity or chemistry. He had been greatly im- 

 pressed by the progress made in the quantity of science teach- 

 ing, which had in some places almost ousted the literary side of 

 teaching. In spite of that large quantity of science teaching, 

 however, the Universities had not yet provided adequate means 

 for the preparation of science teaching : and although there 

 were a great many men teaching scientiBc knowledge and 

 teaching it well, enough had not been done to give them a 

 ■systematic training and to make them not only scientitic men, 

 but skilful, finished, and experienced teachers of science as a 

 special branch of instruction. A good deal remained to be 

 ■done in that way. 



Mr. Bnlfour made the speech of the evening in proposing 

 " Prosperity to the Chemical Society." In the course of his 

 remarks, ho said : In the last speech to which we listened with 

 so much pleasure, the President of the Board of Trade reminded 

 us that his department — one of the most important departments 

 in the Government — was brought face to face and in the closest 

 relation to science almost every day in connection with one or 

 other of the great practical questions with which it has to deal. 

 Undoubtedly that is so, but I think he will probably agree with 

 «ne when 1 say that we politicians — he and I who are engaged 



in the work of everyday political conflict — cannot boast that we 

 or those whom we represent are in the position of using science 

 as the handmaid of great national purposes, or that we have 

 the power to turn it and direct its great forces whither we will. 

 For my own part, though the last thing I wish to do is to sug- 

 gest that the work of practical politicians is o'her than a work 

 which takes the highest qualities of a man, still I have to admit, 

 on looking back on the history of civilisation, that if we want 

 to isolate the causes which, more than any other, conduce to the 

 movements of great civilised societies, you must not look to the 

 politicians of the hour on whom, it may be, all eyes are fixed ; you 

 must look to those who, often unknown by the multitude, whose 

 work, it may be, is never properly realised by the men of their 

 country till after they are dead — you must look on I hem and 

 on their labours to find the great sources of social movements. 

 It is to those who, very often with no special practical object in 

 view, casting their eyes upon no other object than the abstract 

 pure truth which it is their desire to elucidate, penetrate further 

 and further into the secrets of nature and provide the practical 

 man with the material upon which he works — these are the men 

 to whom, if you analyse the social forces to their ultimate units, 

 we owe most, and to produce such men, and to honour such 

 men, and to educate such men, does the Society, whose health 

 I am now proposing, devote its best energies. I do not think, 

 so far as I am acquainted with scientific history, that English- 

 men need fear that they have been behind the rest of the world 

 in evolving those root ideas which are the sources of great 

 discoveries, which are themselves great discoveries, and 

 which are, too, the sources and roots of other great 

 discoveries. It may be, however, that though, as a nation, 

 we have been as productive as other nations — I put it modestly 

 — in the men of genius who have made these fundamental dis- 

 coveries, we have not, as a nation — and I do not think we 

 have — sufficienlly realised how great a bearing theory in these 

 modern days must necessarily have upon practice if we 

 are to keep pace with the rest of the world. We have produced 

 great theorists — none greater. We have produced men of great 

 practical genius — none greater. I am not sure, however, that 

 at this moment we are not behind one at least of the great 

 nations of the continent, perhaps more than one, in the art of 

 combining theory and practice — in the art of so welding to- 

 gether in a great organic and self-supporting whole the man of 

 genius, who at one end of the scale discovers a new law of 

 nature, and the man of practice, on the other hand, whose busi- 

 ness it is to turn these discoveries to account. I do not venture 

 upon a subject upon which, after all, I am not wholly com- 

 l^etent, and I will not develop this subject at greater length ; 

 but I should like to do what I can lo dispel the prejudice which 

 certainly exists at this moment in certain influential quarters 

 against technical education properly understood. Technical 

 education properly understood, suffers greatly under technical 

 education improperly understood, and there is so much nonsense 

 talked upon this subject, there is so much money uselessly spent, 

 there are so many things taught to persons who do not want to 

 learn them, and which, if they did want to learn them, 

 they could by no possibility turn to practical account, 

 that it is no matter of astonishment that some persons 

 arc disposed to say that "technical education is only the 

 last bit of political humbug, the last new scheme for turn- 

 ing out a brand new society ; it is worthless in itself, and not 

 only is it worthless, but it is exceedingly expensive." While I 

 think that those who object to technical education have their 

 justification, it yet remains true that if you include, as you ought 

 to include, within the term technical education, the really 

 scientific instruction which would turn scientific discoveries to 

 practical account — if that is what you mean, or what you ought 

 to mean, by technical instruction, then there is nothing of which 

 England has at this moment any greater need, and there is 

 nothing which, if she, in her folly, determines to neglect it, 

 will more conduce to the success of her rivals in the markets 

 of the world, and to her inevitable abdication of the position of 

 commercial supremacy which she has hitherto held. I do not 

 deny that manufactures and commerce have received an immense 

 amount of gain from theoretical investigations, and, as every- 

 body will admit who has even the most cursory acquaintance 

 with, let us say, the history of discoveries in electricity and 

 magnetising power, science has been the means of great gain 

 through industrial development. While both these things are 

 true, I am the last person to deny that it is a poor end, a poor 

 object for a man of science to look forward to of merely making 



NO. 1327, VOL. 51] 



