Mead URE 
613 
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 26, 1899. 
THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF 
ACADEMIES. 
F late there has been much activity in matters which 
require the co-operation of scientific men of 
different nationalities. The International Catalogue of 
Scientific Literature has been the subject of several con- 
ferences. The International Meteorological Conference 
and the Bureau International des Poids et Mésures are 
samples of different types of organisations which are both 
numerous and useful. 
The exchange of courtesies at Dover between the 
British and French Associations for the Advancement of 
Science gave another proof that cosmopolitanism is grow- 
ing in strength in the scientific world, and can assert itself 
even when the political atmosphere is not unclouded. __ 
A still more striking instance of the same fact will be 
found in the account which we give in another column of 
a conference at which the possibility of founding an 
International Association of the great Academies of the 
world was discussed by their representatives. 
The details of the plan are, we believe, still under con- 
sideration, but enough has been done to make it practically 
certain that the Association will be founded, and that the 
Royal Society, the Academies of Science of France, of 
Berlin, St. Petersburg, Vienna, Rome, Washington and 
other similar bodies will be brought into formal relations 
with each other. It is, no doubt, open to pessimists to 
say that international meetings are now too numerous, 
but we venture to think that the proposal to bring about 
formal conferences between the principal scientific 
bodies in the world is most important, and that the meet- 
ings are likely to lead to more permanent results than do 
gatherings (also useful in their way) from which the 
picnic element is not altogether eliminated. 
On the other hand, an Association of Academies will 
bea more flexible instrument for good than are inter- 
national organisations appointed for specific purposes, and 
composed either of persons named by the Governments 
of the countries represented, or of officials controlling 
national observatories. 
The Committee of the Bureau International des Poids 
et Mésures in Paris and the Geodetic Conference at 
Berlin are examples of bodies which are entrusted with 
strictly defined duties, and cannot travel outside the 
lines laid down for them by their respective Govern- 
ments. A union of Academies would, however, bring 
about the meeting at stated intervals of representatives 
of science, who would not be fettered by the official ties 
which must necessarily restrict the action of Govern- 
ment nominees. It would thus be possible for the 
associated Academies to discuss questions connected 
with any branch of science which might in their opinion 
call for international co-operation, and if they decided 
that such action was. desirable, to take steps to call the 
attention of the scientific world or of the various Govern- 
ments to the necessity for united action. 
The Association would, in fact, enjoy the same | 
freedom as the Council of the Royal Society, while it 
* would be able to bring to bear on any question the | 
NO. 1565, VOL. 60] 
| Edward. 
mature opinion of representatives of the whole scientific 
world. 
It is obvious that an Institution founded on these 
lines may become of the very first importance, and may 
play the part of an international parliament of science. 
Whether or no such a hopeful forecast is realised, it 
cannot but be useful that the centres of scientific organ- 
isation in different countries should themselves be organ- 
ised, and should be united—not merely by common 
interests, or by the bonds of friendship which have been 
established between many of their members—but by 
formal links which will enable them to take united 
action when such action is required. 
As some of the foreign Academies are concerned with 
literature and philosophy as well as with natural science 
the Association will be based upon the same lines. The 
two sections into which it will be divided will, however, 
be almost entirely independent, and no serious difficulty 
need be anticipated on this score. It is, however, curious 
that though both of the great Anglo-Saxon nations pos- 
sess important societies concerned with the cultivation 
of different branches of literature, history or philosophy, 
neither of them has developed an institution the breadth 
of whose aims would warrant its inclusion in a list of 
Academies of literature. It will be unfortunate if this 
fact makes the literary section of the new Association 
less truly representative than that which will be concerned 
with natural science. 
“An academy quite like the French Academy .. . 
we shall hardly have, and perhaps we ought not to wish 
to have it,” said Matthew Arnold, but it will be interest- 
ing to see if the foundation of an International Associa- 
tion of Academies leads to a rearrangement of existing 
organisations which might give us in England something 
corresponding to the ‘‘Académie des Inscriptions et 
Belles-Lettres,” or to the ‘Académie des Sciences 
Morales et Politiques.” 
A PIONEER IN TELEGRAPHY. 
The Life Story of the late Sir Charles Tilston Bright; 
with which ts incorporated the Story of the Atlantic 
Cable and the First Telegraph to India and the 
Colonies. By his Brother, Edward Brailsford Bright, 
and his Son, Charles Bright. Pp. xix + 506, and xi 
+ 701. (Westminster: A. Constable and Co.) 
WO books have recently appeared dealing with tele- 
graphy from shore to shore, the one on ‘‘ Submarine 
Telegraphs” from the pen of Mr. Charles Bright alone, 
the other the two-volume treatise now under review. 
Both are somewhat lengthy, the former because the de- 
scription of “ Submarine Telegraphs” was so much bound 
up with details concerning the life of Sir Charles Bright, 
and the latter because to the ‘“‘ Life Story of the late Sir 
Charles Bright” has been added so much about the 
history of submarine telegraphy. 
Leaving the accounts of the ancestors of this family 
which are given in rather bewildering detail, we come to 
the boyhood and youth of the two brothers Charles and 
Charles at fifteen, and Edward at sixteen, 
entered the service of the Electric Telegraph Company 
soon after its formation in 1847, and started on their 
careers as inventors. In 1849 they devised a method 
DD 
