May 8, 1902 | 
NATURE 55 
the sources of that stream are to be sought in Rhodesia, 
where the ancient gold-workings are stated to have 
yielded a total output of at least 75,000,000/. Then it 
is asked, “Where else but Rhodesia did the ancient 
Sabzeans obtain the vast supply of gold which they pur- 
veyed to Phcenicia, Egypt and the rest of the then known 
world? The only answer possible at present is: 
Rhodesia ; and the later discoveries in Rhodesia only 
serve to strengthen and emphasise this answer.” Hence 
the inference that Rhodesia was the Biblical Ophir, 
though the point is not regarded as settled. Indeed, 
in their preface, written after the appearance of my 
“Gold of Ophir,” the authors seem inclined to adopt the 
modified view that Rhodesia was the source, and Ophir 
in South Arabia the importer and distributor, of these 
treasures throughout the ancient world. My conclusions 
bearing on this solution of the question are given in full, 
and seem to be tacitly accepted. 
But the authors remind us more than once that their 
object has not been to advocate any particular theory, 
Fic. 2.—Gold ornaments and pottery discovered at Dhlo-Dhlo and M'telegwa Ruins. on 
7 
but ‘‘to allow facts to speak for themselves.” Judged 
from this standpoint, the work must be pronounced an 
unqualified success. It would be impossible to improve 
upon the general plan, by which Jaw and order is intro- 
duced into a chaos of small but indispensable details, 
brought together during six years of continuous explora- 
tion amid the ancient ruins south of the Zambesi. 
Students of Rhodesian antiquities will also feel grateful 
for the aid afforded by the accompanying large-scale map, 
which covers the whole ground and shows in red letter- 
ing the exact position of the five hundred ruined sites 
which have so far been either described or reported in 
every part of Rhodesia. 
Limitation of space prevents more than the merest 
reference to many incidental matters, such as the struc- 
tures now recognised as slave-pits, the extensive terraced 
slopes of the Inyanga and Mount Fura districts exactly 
resembling those of the Yemen uplands, the quartz 
crushers, the gold-smelting works, the numerous gold 
NO. 1697, VOL. 66] 
crucibles showing gold in the flux, and especially the 
massive gold objects—beads, bangles, plates, wire, pegs, 
nails, ferrules—which were so characteristic of the monu- 
ments of the first period, and of which more than 2000 ozs. 
have already been collected (Fig. 2). Some of the 
ornaments, obviously manufactured on the spot and dis- 
playing considerable artistic taste and technical skill, 
were found on the original cemented floors, while others 
were taken from the skeletons of men, women and 
children buried under the floors. ‘All the branches of 
the goldsmiths’ art were practised by them, including 
gold wire drawing, beating gold into thin sheets, plating 
iron and bronze with gold, and burnishing” (p. 93). 
It is evident from such details as these, as well as from 
the slave-pits, the chains of forts stretching along the old 
highways seawards, and the terraced slopes erected with 
prodigious labour for agricultural purposes, that the 
country was not merely conquered, but settled, that it 
was a true colony in the modern sense of the term, and 
was held as such by the South Arabian Himyarites for 
many generations. But 
enough has perhaps been 
said to show the great value 
of a work which places the 
Ophir question on a new 
footing and sets history back 
some two millenniums in the 
austral world. 
A. H. KEANE. 
THE INSTITUTION OF 
ELECTRICAL ENGIN- 
EERS AND ELECTRI- 
CAL LEGISLATION. 
EFERENCE is made 
in our notes columns 
to the ceremony performed 
by Sir Frederick Bramwell 
in connection with the South 
Wales electrical power dis- 
tribution scheme. The Bill 
for the promotion of this 
scheme was, it will be re- 
membered, one of six before 
a Select Committee of Par- 
liament. presided over by 
Sir J. Kitson last year. 
These Bills gave rise to a 
paper read by Mr. W. L. 
Madgen before the Institu- 
tion of Electrical Engineers 
“The Electrical Power 
ills of 1900: Before and 
After ” (Journal Inst. Elec. Engin. vol. xxx. p. 475); 1m 
which the author dealt with the question of England’s 
backwardness in the development of electrical engineer- 
ing. The paper may be considered in some respects 
one of the most important communicated to the Institu- 
tion of late years. It led to a prolonged discussion—the 
report of the proceedings occupies more than sixty pages 
of the Institution’s /owvna/—in which, though various 
opinions were expressed as to the cause of our deficiency, 
the general conclusion seemed to be reached that the 
backwardness was due largely to the out-of-date and 
grandmotherly legislation which governed electrical 
undertakings. As a result, a powerful committee was 
appointed by the council of the Institution to report on 
the subject and advise the council whether they should 
take any action, and if so what action, to improve the 
position. The members of the committee were the 
following :—-Profs. W. E. Ayrton, J. Perry and S. P. 
Thompson, Major P. Cardew, ‘Lieut.-Colonel 1 De 
