NATURE 



169 



THURSDAY. JUNE 25, 1903. 



SCIENCE AND THE NAVY. 

 II. 

 TN a former article' we referred at some length to the 

 new Navy scheme, pointing out that in our opinion 

 the scientific education of naval officers, and there- 

 fore the whole naval service of the country, must 

 be vastly improved by its provisions. Since this 

 article appeared there have been debates in both Houses 

 of Parliament, including a most important one on 

 May 9, in which Lord Selborne in an admirable speech 

 gave some new information concerning the proposed 

 scheme of education, and on the 15th inst. a circular 

 letter was issued relating to the selection, training, and 

 advancement of navigating officers. There has also 

 been much discussion in the public Press; in this, as 

 was to have been expected, scientific questions have 

 been only lightly touched; and when the engineer 

 question has been broached, its relation to the Admiralty 

 practice regarding the other officers who must possess 

 high technical knowledge has not, in our opinion, been 

 pointed out. 



But when we pass from the criticism of the new 

 arrangements to the first steps actually taken to give 

 effect to them, the opinion is quite general that the 

 Admiralty is to be entirely congratulated. Prof. 

 Ewing, who may be looked upon as the creator of the 

 admirable engineering school at Cambridge, thereby 

 showing that his powers of administration and organ- 

 isation are on a par with his scientific acquirements, 

 has been selected to fill the post of Director-General 

 of Naval Instruction ; his duty, we take it, will, to a 

 large extent, be to do for the personnel what the 

 Director of Naval Construction does for the matdriel 

 of the fleet. 



We may be convinced not only that with such a 

 strong man as this at the helm the complete scientific 

 instruction of officers will be insisted upon, but that 

 practical laboratory instruction of the juniors in mathe- 

 matics and pure science will be secured. 



Indeed, we may go further, and say that they have 

 already been secured in most admirable fashion, for 

 Lord Selborne, in the speech to which we have already 

 referred, spoke as follows : — ■ 



" Without pledging myself to exact detail, I will 

 give a general sketch of the kind of education that will 

 be given. It includes not only that special education 

 for which the school will exist, but that general educa- 

 tion which every officer and trentleman ought to have. 

 Histor}', geography, physical geography, English and 

 French will be taught. I do not say that other modern 

 languages will not be taught. Mathematics, algebra, 

 arithmetic, trigonometry, mechanics, physics, labor- 

 atory work, seamanship, drill and engineering will 

 be taught. There will be laboratories and workshops 

 in which the boys will be accustomed to the use of tools 

 from the very commencement. There will be vessels 

 of all sorts for use and demonstration, from a launch 

 to a battleship, and generally an effort will be made, 

 while not neglecting the general education of the boys, 

 to start them from the moment of their entering the 

 college on the education of a naval officer." 



1 Vol. Ixvii. p. 289. 



NO. 1756, VOL. 68] 



When we compare this programme with the one 

 hour a fortnight in physics in the Britannia, and no 

 laboratory within sight, students of science well re- 

 cognise that naval education for the future will be 

 conducted on business principles, and we may again 

 express our regret that such a system, mutatis 

 mutandis, is still a thing to hope for in some dim 

 distant future in the case of the Army. 



In our former articlfe we pointed out how the subject 

 of navigation suffered generally from the absence ot 

 a school afloat for practical work similar to those pro- 

 vided long ago for gunnery and torpedo work. Not 

 only is this defect in the system to disappear in the case 

 of the junior officers, but as stated in the circular letter 

 to which we have referred, the regulations for the in- 

 struction of navigating officers have been revised so 

 that a definite course of practical training may be given 

 them in a navigation school ship which is about to be 

 established at Portsmouth, with a suitable staff of in- 

 structors. The course of instruction while they are 

 attached to the school ship will last for ninety working 

 days, part of the time being spent at sea in the ship 

 and the remainder on shore. While going through the 

 course they will live on the school ship. 



After the candidates have qualified in the school they 

 will serve for a short period in the large ships of the 

 Mediterranean, Home and Channel fleets, so as to 

 obtain experience under the navigating officers in the 

 work of a fleet in regard to navigating duties. 



It would be difficult to overestimate me importance 

 of these new departures, about which very little has 

 been said in the various discussions of the new 

 scheme, although, in our opinion, they are precisely 

 those by which the greatest benefit to the service will 

 be secured in the future. 



Leaving on one side the objections to the new 

 scheme which have been based on prejudice or a 

 complete ignorance of the changes in any naval service 

 which the progress of science has rendered inevitable, 

 we may say that the question of the possible inter- 

 changeability of the officers at some distant date 

 has attracted most attention in relation to the new 

 training of the Engineers. On this point opinion has 

 rapidly grown in favour of the new scheme, since 

 inquiry has shown what a large common basis of pure 

 science underlies the proper performance of any one 

 of the specialised duties. The objections, in short, 

 have been held by advocates of technical education 

 in its worst sense, that is, the rule-of-thumb carrying 

 out of practical processes without any inkling of the 

 scientific principles involved. 



We indicated in our last article that, although the 

 new scheme provides for a system of interchangeability 

 when once it is in full working order, the present 

 practice is vastly different, and as we consider this 

 interchangeability of paramount importance from the 

 point of view of utilising to the utmost the results of 

 the complete scientific instruction of our naval officers 

 to be provided in future, it is important to return to 

 this subject in somewhat fuller detail to show tlic im- 

 portant bearing of another part of the new circular. 



\\ (■ may begin by saying that our present naval 

 oil". 1^, so far as their scientific training goes, may 



I 



