NATURE 
217 
THURSDAY, JULY 17, 1873 
THE PAY OF SCIENTIFIC MEN 
ot ead are a good many points of interest attaching 
to the Parliamentary paper referring to the pay of 
the officers of the British Museum, which, thanks to 
Lord George Hamilton, has been issued during this 
week, 
It shows in a striking manner what the Government 
thinks of Science and its votaries ; nor is this all: it 
shows in a not less striking manner how it behoves men 
of Science, if they consider that there should be a career 
for Science at all, to at once take some action, in order 
that their real claims may be conceded. Mr. Lowe, in de- 
fending not long ago the high rate of pay of Treasury 
clerks, who “begin” at 250/. a year and rise quickly to 
1,200/, (if they are unfortunate enough not to get a staff 
appointment with much higher pay, long before they 
would, in the ordinary course of promotion, reach the 
senior class), stated that what was principally wanted at 
the Treasury, over and above the ordinary qualities of a 
clerk, was a certain “ freemasonry,” which was best got at 
the public schools. For this “ freemasonry” Mr. Lowe is 
willing to pay 150/. a year over and above the 100/. which 
is the usual commencing pay of a junior clerk in the other 
Crown offices. 
Perhaps it is too much to say that this ‘‘ Freemasonry ” 
is required in the British Museum. But there is cer- 
tainly something required in the case of the scientific 
appointments there, of as special a character ; and that is 
a knowledge of Science. 
What then does Mr. Lowe do to secure this specialty ? 
He gives the man of Science who enters the Museum the 
magnificent sum of go/. per annum on entrance, with the 
still more magnificent—-but, unfortunately, very distant— 
prospect of attaining an income of 600/, So that :— 
Public School Freemasonry : Scientific Attainments : : 250/. : 9o/. 
This state of things has recently been brought home to 
the Trustees by petitions from all grades in the Museum, 
and a sub-committee of the Trustees has reported 
that, “owing to the insufficiency of the salaries, the 
slowness of their progressive rise, and the lowness of 
their maximum, the trustees are losing, and will continue 
to lose, their best men.” 
As a result of this report, in which we consider that 
higher ground might have been taken, the Trustees have 
proposed a new scale to the Treasury, the only fault of 
which is that—with the exception of the case of principal 
Librarian, who is not a specialist, who has no special 
work to do which could not be done by the keepers acting 
in turn as Dean, and who already has just double the salary 
of the most highly-paid keeper—it is far too modest. As 
the Daily News has well put it, a maximum of 500/. 
is “certainly not a too lavish position fora man who 
must be a scholar and linguist, an archzeologist, natu- 
alist, or chemist, and must in most cases be already in 
middle life.” 
The men upon whose heads, hands, reputation, and 
work the success and fame of the Museum depend, are 
No. 194—VOL, VIII. 
the keepers, whose pay, even as revised, is a mere pit- 
tance for such service as they render. 
Altogether, the eventual /ofa/ increased annual expendi- 
ture would amount to 5,7o0/. a year—the pay of one 
political or legal placeman, who has properly employed 
his “ Freemasonry.” 
Here is the Treasury reply :— 
y * Treasury Chambers, March 28, 1873 
“My Lords and Gentlemen,—The Lords Commissioners 
of Her Majesty’s Treasury have had before them two 
letters from Mr. Winter Jones, dated the 4th instant, 
submitting recommendations for the grant of increase of 
salary to the principal Librarian and Secretary, and to 
various other officers of your establishment, and they 
desire me to say that, after giving their most careful 
consideration to all the statements put before them, they 
regret that they would not feel warranted in acceding 
to any alteration in the present scale of salaries, 
“T have, &c. 
(Signed) “ WILLIAM Law” 
We trust that some determined stand will be made by 
the Trustees—among whom is the Right Hon. Robert 
Lowe—against this monstrous letter ;' and we trust also 
that some general protest will be made by men of Science 
and Culture generally against this latest valuation of 
these acquirements by the Government. 
The man of Science serves his country as well as the 
politician, the lawyer, the soldier, or the sailor, although 
perhaps his claims are not stated in so blatant a manner, 
nor are at present so generally acknowledged, whether they 
will be in the future must to a large extent depend upon 
men of Science themselves : but whether this be conceded 
or not, surely in a country where the State remuneration 
for services performed is extraordinarily high in the upper 
appointments, our scientific chiefs in the public service 
should at all events receive the means of a decent liveli- 
hood, and such men as are employed in the British 
Museum, many of whom have world-wide reputations, 
should at least be treated as well as Government clerks. 
Surely this is not to ask too much? Nay, it is already 
conceded by the Government in many departments 
where special scientific knowledge is required of no 
higher order than that which is so shabbily treated in the 
one Institution of which we have the greatest reason to be 
proud. 
THE “ POLARIS” ARCTIC EXPEDITION 
\ E have just received the printed Report, pre- 
sented to the President of the United States 
by the naval authorities, of the result of their exa- 
mination of those of the crew of the Po/aris, who, in 
October last, were severed from that ship, and drifted on 
an ice-floe from about 80° north latitude during the whole 
of the winter until, 600 miles south from their starting- 
point, they were picked up on April 30, of this year, by 
the Tigress off the coast of Labrador. The Report fur- 
nishes material for one more of those thrilling narratives 
of Arctic adventure, which will be the delight of the boy- 
hood of all genefations, and which, commencing in the 
roth century with that of Bjorne the Norseman, have 
been accumulating in increasing proportion, and will 
never fail to be added to until not a shred of mystery re- 
mains to unravel within the Arctic circle. The advocates 
of Arctic exploration by way of Smith’s Sound, needed 
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