April 2'$>, 1887 ] 



NA TURE 



619 



flactuations which may ensue in the value of our natural resources, 

 and the consequent condition of one or other of our important in- 

 dustries, arising out of continued advances made in the application 

 of science to the perfection or transformation of manufacturing pro- 

 cesses, and of the stimulating elTects of such fluctuations upon the 

 exertions of those who are able to brinj scientific knowledge to 

 bear upon the solution of problems in industrial operations which 

 entirely bafHe the ordinary manufacturer. Within that period the 

 inventions of Bessemer and of Siemens have led to the replacement 

 of iron by steel in some of its most extensive applications. This 

 important change in our national industry was, ere long, pro- 

 ductive of a serious crisis therein, and for the reason that the pig 

 iron jiroduced from a large jiroportion of those ores which, from 

 their abundance and the cheapness of their treatment, have been 

 greatly instrumental in placing Great Britain in her high position 

 as an iron-producing nation, could not be applied to the produc- 

 tion of marketable steel by means of the Bessemer converter. 

 Hence the application of this rapid steel-making process had to 

 he chiefly restricted to particular kinds of ores, free from the 

 impurity, phosphorus, which it was powerless to eliminate ; the 

 supplies of such ores being limited to a few districts in this 

 country. These had to be largely supplemented by importations 

 from other countries ; nevertheless the cheapness of production 

 and superiority in point of strength, durability, and lightness of 

 the steel rails thus sent into the market from the Bessemer con- 

 verter combined to maintain a supremacy of them over iron rails, 

 &c., manufactured by the old puddling process from the staple 

 ores of the country. 

 1 The advantages presented by steel over the wrought iron of 



I the puddling furnace for constructive purposes speedily became 



evident, and the effect of the r.apid displacement of malleable iron 

 by steel produced from ores of a particular class has been that at 

 least 85 to 90 per cent, of the iron ore; of Great Britain could no 

 longer be applied to the production of material for rails, 

 for ships, and for other important structures. Great has been 

 the apprehension among the owners of those ores that the 

 demand for iron which they can furnish could not revive, but the 

 scientific metallurgist has successfully grappled, from more than 

 ■ me direction, with tlje great problem of restoring their com- 

 mercial importance ; and a simple alteration of the method of 

 carr}'ing out the Bessemer process has within the last few years 

 led to really triumphant results, with the employment of those 

 ores which before could onlj' be dealt with by the searching 

 operation of the old puddling furnace. A new era has thus been 

 established in steel manufacture, there being now but very few 

 restrictions to the application of the quick processes to iron pro- 

 duced from all varieties of ores. Indeed, the treatment is actually 

 bein^ applied profitably to the recovery of iron from the rich 

 slag forming the refuse-product of the puddling furnace in the 

 production of malleable iron, which before had been condemned 

 10 limited usefulness as a material for road-making. Yet another 

 most interesting and valuable result has been achieved by this 

 simple application of scientific knowledge. The slag or refuse- 

 product of the so-called basic treatment of iron contains, in the 

 form of phosphates of lime and magnesia, the whole of the 

 phosphorus which it is the main function of that treatment to 



I .separate from the metal ; it was soon found that the phosphoric 



acid was there presented in a condition as readily susceptible of 

 ' assimilation by plants as it is in the valuable artificial manure 



known ^as superphosphate ; this refuse-slag, simply ground up, 

 constitutes therefore a valuable manure which already commands 

 a ready sale at very profitable prices. 



The origination of this latest advance in the development of 

 steel manufacture dates back only nine years, and already the 

 year's product of the basic process amounts to over 1,300,000 

 tons of steel. But although it is to Englishmen that the owner 

 of iron property and the steel-maker are again indebted for these 

 important results, and to English manufacturers that the first 

 practical demonstration of the success of this process is due, its 

 application has been far more rapidly elaborated upon the Con- 

 lin-nt than here ; in Germany the importance of the subject was 

 at once realised, and it is there that considerably the largest pro- 

 portion of steel is produced by the basic treatment ; it is in 

 Ger.nany also that the value of the slag for agricultural purposes 

 has been developed, the first steps in its utilisation here being 

 bu just now taken, in Staffordshire. 



I have already referred to the remarkable strides which have 

 been made in the extension of iron manufacture in the United 

 States ; the development there of steel production has been no less 

 marvellous, and the causes of this are evident ; the resources of 



the country in ore and fuel are gigantic, and the systematic 

 technical training of the people has made its influence felt upon 

 the development of this as of every other branch of industry 

 which our friendly rivals pursue. But it is not only in the 

 United States that the development in the production of iron 

 and steel has greatly increased of late years ; thus, in Germany 

 the increase in the production of pig iron alone, during the last 

 twenty-one years, has been 237 per cent., while with us it has 

 been 75 per cent. 



Although, however, the increase in actual production of iron 

 and steel in Great Britain has not kept pace with that of some 

 other countries, it is satisfactory to know that our productive 

 power has very greatly increased in late years, ancl there is 

 probably no one branch of our industries in which we have 

 maintained our position so satisfactorily in regard to quality of 

 product as that of iron and steel manufacture, even though, every 

 now and then, we have indications that in the struggle with other 

 nations for superiority of product and for pre-eminence in con- 

 tinuity of progress, we have to look to our laurels. 



There are, however, other i nportant branches of industry, for 

 a time essentially our own, the present condition of which, in 

 this country, we carmot contemplate with equal satisfaction. 

 Several instructive illustrations might be quoted, but I will 

 content myself with a brief examination of one of the most 

 interesting. 



In illustrating the advances which were being made, thirty-five 

 years ago, as demonstrated by the E,xhibition of 1S51, Playfair 

 referred to the great development of the value of the evil-smelling 

 coal-tar, which was then made to furnish the solvent liquids benzene 

 and naphtha, and the antiseptic creosote, the residual material 

 being utilised for pavements and for artificial fuel. The chemist 

 little dreamt then that between 1S51 and the year of the next 

 great Exhibition, 1S62, coal-tar would have become a mine of 

 wealth equally to science, the manufactures, and to the arts, in 

 which fresh workings have ever since continued to be opened up, 

 and still present themselves for exploration. Hofmann, in his 

 valuable report on the chemical products and processes eluci- 

 dated by that Exhibition, dwells with the enthusiasm of the 

 ardent worker in science upon the brilliant products obtained 

 from coal-tar which had resulted from the labours of the scientific 

 chemist, and had already acquired an almost national importance, 

 although this great industry was then still in its infancy. From 

 the year 1856, when the first colouring-matter, known as mauve, was 

 discovered and manufactured by one of Hofmann's most promis- 

 ing young pupils, Mr. Perkin, down to the present time, the 

 production of new coal-tar colours, or of new processes for pre- 

 paring the known colours in greater purity, has progressed 

 uninterruptedly, this industry having long since become one of 

 the most important, and also one of the most remarkable, as 

 illustrating by each stage of its development the direct application 

 of scientific research to the attainment of momentous practical 

 results. 



The difficulties to be overcome before mauve could be pro- 

 duced upon a manufacturing scale were very great, and were only 

 solved by a steady pursuit of scientific research, side by side with 

 practical experiments suggested by its results. Aniline— the 

 parent of the first coal-tar colour, a liquid organic alkali — a most 

 fertile source of interesting and important discoveries in organic 

 chemistry, was produced with difficulty by various methods in 

 very small quantities, so as to be almost a chemical curiosity 

 at the time of the discovery of mauve. Among the sub- 

 stances from which it had been prepared was the volatile 

 liquid known as benzene, first discovered in the labora- 

 tory of this Institution in 1825 by Faraday, in the liquid 

 products condensed from oil gas, but afterwards obtained by 

 Mansfield, in the College of Chemistry, from coal-tar naphtha. 

 The conversion of benzene into aniline was accomplished as a 

 manufacturing process after many difiiculties by Perkin ; and 

 wiihin a year after the discovery of mauve by him, it was in the 

 hands of the silk dyer. Perkin's success led other chemists at once 

 to pursue researches in the same direction, especially in France, 

 %\ here the next important coal-tar colour, magenta or fuchsine, 

 was obtained, by M. Verguin, the successful manufacture of 

 which in a pure state was, however, first accomplished by English 

 chemists. In 1S61 beautiful violet and blue colours were pro- 

 duced, again by French chemists, but were manufactured shortly 

 afterwards in a pure state in England. 



The six years succeeding those which formed the first period 

 (1S54-62) of existence of this industry were fruilful, not only 

 of many beautiful new dyes, first produced in England, but also 



