1879 Change in the composition of the Club 427 



attending to his county business and managing his property, 

 is interested in natural history or some other branch of 

 science, which he does what he can to support and 

 encourage, used to be a valuable member both of the 

 Royal Society and of the Club. But he has almost dis- 

 appeared from each. Men of affairs, whether in Church 

 or State, who had weight in the community, used to 

 be chosen in some number into the Society and thence 

 into the Club, and their presence was even welcomed 

 within the Council. They have now been in great part 

 eliminated. 



The change may have begun in the earlier decades of 

 last century, but there can be no doubt that it has been 

 mainly the result of the revolution in the mode of election 

 of Fellows which was effected in 1847. That absolutely 

 necessary and, on the whole, most beneficial reform gradually 

 brought back the Society to what in its original Charter was 

 intended to be its characteristic object the pursuit of 

 studies for " promoting by the authority of experiments 

 the sciences of natural things and of useful arts." The 

 Society was slowly purged, of the numerous members who 

 had no claim to possess any scientific qualification or to 

 have shown any interest in furthering the progress of science. 

 The Society has thus become a much stronger institution, 

 comprising the leaders in every great branch of science 

 in the country, and counting in the list of its foreign 

 members some of the most distinguished scientific leaders 

 abroad. 



But while the Society has undoubtedly gained immensely 

 in scientific weight by the reform, it has lost something of 

 the breadth and variety of culture which it formerly pos- 

 sessed. This loss is perhaps more visibly perceptible at 

 the table of the Club than elsewhere. The presence of men 

 of letters, art or affairs in its membership saved it from 

 becoming too professional and professorial. While the 

 non-scientific men were glad to hear from the philosophers 

 the latest results of experiment and enquiry, the latter in 

 turn would often find that in regard to the affairs of 



