September 6, 1906J 



NA TUBE 



467 



aiu-c '" is very rare, oxrepl for this ur that eoiiiniiltfe; 

 and the neophyte of science who, led by some special 

 j^uest, enters with bated breath witliin its doors, finds 

 ample rooms held in a solemn silence broken only by 

 the scratching of the pens or the guarded tread of the 

 officials, and goes away chilled with the rarefied air 

 of the higher realms of science. He meets w^th a 

 warmer, more congenial attnosphere in his own 

 " special society." 



The presidinli.il address of 1903 makes it clear, on 

 the one hand, Ih.it the special societies ought to 

 e.xist, to prosper, .and even to multiply, and, on the 

 other hand, that the attempt to establish formal rela- 

 tions between them .-md tlie Rov.il Sini(t\ wciuUl 



The addresses of i<i()2 and 1905 deal mainly with 

 scientific education. Many wise words are said in 

 tlieni, but so much has been and is still being said 

 about scientific education that nothing need be added 

 here e.vcept perhaps to express regret that the 

 manifesto of the council of 1904, a sequel to the 

 address of 1902, should have jjroduced so little good. 

 It seems to have served chielly as an instrument in 

 the hands of those upholding the old ways, a result 

 partly, perhaps, due to the fact that the stalement of 

 a bodv consisting of a number of men of diverging 

 views was naturally purged from all strong words, 

 and took the form of a chain of mild platitudes. 



The addrcs-. of 111114 dr.ils wilh the difiicult question 



[ing Koom of the Royal Society, BurlingK 



From ■' The Royal Society," by Sir Vl^illiam Muggins, K.C.B. 



probably fail to secuie any really useful results. But 

 might not much be done in an informal way? If the 

 society could put on a less solemn, more genial face, 

 if it could make its fellows feel that it belonged to 

 ihem rather than that they belonged to it, if it could 

 make it clear that it was really the central home for 

 .ill the sciences, that it was anxious to advance 

 natural knowledge by placing its great resources 

 freely at the command, not only of the chosen few 

 who happen to be its present fellows, but of the great 

 many whose work is pushing science on, it would b? 

 weaving bonds binding to it the younger men and 

 the special societies, in a way no written treaties with 

 i-l;ihorate compromises could ever bind them. 



NO. 1923, VOL. 74I 



of the relation of the Royal Society to the State. The 

 late president in that address gives an account of the 

 many great unpaid services which the society has 

 rendered, and continues to render, to the State. On 

 the one hand, it seems most unjust that men of 

 science, whose wrestling against poverty is in most 

 cases as strenuous as their wrestling for truth, should 

 give their time and labour to the State without any 

 remuneration whatever. Had the society been re- 

 warded for what it has done for His Majesty's 

 Government in the way law-yers are rewarded for 

 what they do for it, the society would by this time 

 have been rolling in wealth. But it receives from the 

 State absolutelv nothing bevond the use of the rooms 



