August 2, 1906] 



NA TURE 



THE YORK MEETING OF THE BRITISH 

 ASSOCIATION. 



THE York meeting of the British Association, 

 which was opened as we went to press last 

 iiiijht, promises to be a very large one. The local 

 arrangements and the programmes of the various sec- 

 tions have already been described in these columns. 

 Among the representatives from abroad who are 

 expected at the meeting are the following : — Section A. 

 Prof. H. Rubens, the University, Berlin ; Prof. C. G. 

 RocUwood, Prof. F. P. Whitman. Section B, Prof. 

 Paul Pelseneer, Ghent; M. G. Grandidier, Paris; Dr. 

 and Mrs. Yves Delage, Paris ; Prof. Lx)oss, Cairo ; 

 Prof. Gary N. Calkins, New York; Prof. H. F. E. 

 Jungcrson, Copenhagen; Dr. Gustave Loisel, Utrecht. 

 Section C, Prof. Edgworth David, Sydney. Sec- 

 lion E, Prof. Loezy, Budapest. Section F, Prof. 

 K. Wicksell, Lund. Section K, Prof. W. 

 Johannsen, Copenhagen; Prof. C. H. Ostenfeld, 

 Copenhagen ; Dr. C. Rosenberg, Stockholm ; Prof. E. 

 Pfitzer, Heidelberg; Prof, and Mrs. Jeffrey, Harvard 

 University; Prof. Ligrier, Caen; Prof. H. Potonie, 

 Berlin. Corresponding member, Prof. C. Julin, 

 Li<?ge. 



The Court of the University of Leeds has resolved 

 to confer the honorary degree of D.Sc. upon the fol- 

 lowing in connection with this meeting of the Associa- 

 tion :— Prof. E. Ray Lankester, F.R.S. ; Prof. A. Gran- 

 didier, of Paris ; Prof. P. Pelseneer, of Ghent ; and Prof. 

 H. Rubens, of Berlin. The degree of D.Sc. will be 

 conferred upon the following in connection with the 

 meeting of the Association and also with the coal-tar- 

 colour jubilee :— Sir W. H. Perkin, Dr. Heinrich Caro, 

 of Mannheim ; Prof. Albin Haller, of Paris ; Prof. C. 

 Liebermann, of Berlin; and Dr. C. A. von Martins, of 

 Berlin. 



Inaugural Address by Prof. E. Ray Lankester, M.A., 



LL.D., D.Sc, F.R.S., F.L.S., Director of the 



Natural History Departments of the British Museum, 



President of the Association. 



' My Lords, Ladies and Gentlemen, — It is, first of all, 



my privilege to thank you for the distinguished honour 



you have done me in electing me President of this great 



scientific Association — an honour which is enhanced by the 



fact that our meeting this year is once more held in the 



venerable city of York, in which seventy-five years ago 



the British Association for the Advancement of Science held 



its first meeting. 



It is a great pleasure to me to convey to the Lord Mayor 

 and the dignitaries and citizens of York your hearty thanks 

 for the invitation to meet this year in their city. It seems 

 to have become a custom that the Association should be 

 invited at regular intervals to assemble in the city where 

 it took birth and to note the progress made in the objects 

 for the furtherance of which it was founded. A quarter 

 of a century ago we met here under the presidency of that 

 versatile leader in public affairs — Sir John Lubbock, now 

 Lord Avebury. That occasion was the jubilee — the fiftieth 

 anniversary — of the .'\ssociation. 



Lord Avebury on that occasion gave as his presidential 

 address a survey of the progress of science during the fifty 

 years of the Association's existence. He had a wonderful 

 story to tell, and told it with a fulness which was only 

 possible to one of his wide range of knowledge and keen 

 interest in the various branches of science. If I venture 

 on the present occasion to say a few words as to the great 

 features in the. progress of our knowledge of Nature during 

 the last twenty-five years, it will be readily understood 

 that the mere volume of new knowledge to be surveyed 

 has become so vast that a full and detailed statement such 

 as that which Lord Avebury placed before the Association 

 at its jubilee is no longer possible in a single address 

 delivered from the President's chair. 



Let me ask you before we go further to take for a few 

 moments a more personal retrospect and to thinl-c of the 



NO. IQ18, VOL. 74] 



founders of this Association, then of the great workers in 

 science who were still alive in 1881 when last we met here 

 and have since gone from among us, leaving their great 

 deeds and their noble enthusiasm to inspire now and for 

 all future time those who have vowed themselves to the 

 advancement of science in this realm of Britain. 



There must be some here who had the privilege of 

 personal acquaintance with several of the men who founded 

 this .Association in York seventy-five years ago. I myself 

 knew Prof. John Phillips, Sir Charles Lyell, Sir Roderick 

 Murchison, Sir David Brewster, Dr. Whewell, and Mr. 

 Harcourt of Nuneham. All these fathers of our Association 

 had passed away before our last meeting in York. And 

 now, in the quarter of a century which has rolled by and 

 brought us here again, we have lost many who took an 

 active part in its annual meetings and were familiar figures 

 in the scientific world of the later Victorian period. 

 Huxley and Tyndall, Spottiswoode and Cayley, Owen and 

 Flower, Williamson and Frankland, Falconer and Busk, 

 Prestwich and Godwin Austen, RoUeston and Henry Smith, 

 Stokes and Tait, and many others are in that list, in- 

 cluding one v/hosc name was, and is, more often heard 

 in our discussions than any other, though he himself never 

 was able to join us — I mean Charles Darwin. Happily 

 some of the scientific veterans of the nineteenth century 

 are still living, if not with us in York. Sir Joseph 

 Hooker, who visited the Antarctic with Ross in 1839, is 

 still hale and hearty, and so are Alfred Russel Wa'.Iace, 

 Lord Kelvin, Sir William Huggins, and many others who 

 were already veteran leaders in scientific investigation 

 when last we visited York : they are still active in thought, 

 observation, and experiment. 



In attempting to give an outline of the advancement of 

 science in the past twenty-five years I think it is necessary 

 to distinguish two main kinds of advancement, both of 

 which our founders had in view. Francis Bacon gave the 

 title " Advancement of Learning " to that book in which 

 he explained not merely the methods by which the increase 

 of knowledge was possible, but advocated the promotion 

 of knowledge to a new and influential position in the 

 organisation of human society. His purpose, says Dean 

 Church, was " to make knowledge really and intelligently 

 the interest, not of the school or the study or the labor- 

 atory only, but of society at large." This is what our 

 founders also intended by their use of the word " advance- 

 ment." So that in surveying the advancement of science 

 in the past quarter of a century we of the British Associ- 

 ation must ask not only what are the new facts discovered, 

 the new ideas and conceptions which have come into 

 activity, but what progress has science made in becoming 

 really and intelligently the interest of society at large. Is 

 there evidence that there is an increase in the influence of 

 science on the lives of our fellow-citizens and in the great 

 affairs of the State? Is there an increased provision for 

 securing the progress of scientific investigation in propor- 

 tion to the urgency of its need or an increased disposition 

 to secure the employment of really competent men trained 

 in scientific investigation for the public service? 



I. The Increase of Knowledge in the Several 

 Branches of Science. 

 The boundaries of my own understanding and the prac- 

 tical consideration of what is appropriate to a brief address 

 must limit my attempt to give to the general public who 

 follow with friendly interest our proceedings some present- 

 ation of what has been going on in the workshops of 

 science in this last quarter of a century. My point of view 

 is essentially that of. the naturalist, and in my endeavour 

 to speak of some of the new things and new properties of 

 things discovered in recent years I find it is impossible to 

 give any systematic or detailed account of what has been 

 done in each division of science. All that I can attempt 

 is to mention some of the discoveries which have aroused 

 my own interest and admiration. I feel, indeed, that it is 

 necessary to ask your forbearance for my presumption in 

 daring to speak of so many subjects in which I cannot 

 claim to speak as an authority, but only as a younger 

 brother full of fraternal pride and sympathy in the glorious 

 achievements of the great experimentalists and discoverers 

 of our ■Jay. The duty of attempting some indication of 



