234 



NA TURE 



[July 4, 1907 



this faculty in our factories are such as might be reason- 

 ably expected from the known requirements of chemical 

 industry ? 



In answer to this question I am afraid we must come 

 to the conclusion that here also there is an enormous sub- 

 mergence of research talent going on. It is true that the 

 position is improving — that some of our more enlightened 

 manufacturers have realised the value of such men, and 

 by taking advantage of their faculties have improved their 

 various industries. But these cases are as yul e.\ccptional, 

 and the ideal will never be reached until the research 

 laboratory becomes a recognised and well-staffed depart- 

 ment in every chemical factory. Do our factories possess 

 departments which can honestly be described as centres 

 of research in the sense, say, of the research laboratories 

 of the German colour factories? I am afraid not; indeed, 

 I know of scores of young men of great promise and 

 ability who have been swallowed up by the factories and 

 gradually degraded, in the chemical sense, into mere 

 machines carrying out routine work which really required 

 no elaborate chemical education for its effective perform- 

 ance. There is, of course, no satisfactory means of 

 measuring the influence of the newer education upon the 

 chemical industries of this country, and we can only speak 

 from individual experience concerning the careers of our 

 own students. It is upon this experience that I base the 

 conclusion that our country is wasting its resources in a 

 most reckless way so far as concerns the chemical indus- 

 tries. There is an enormous amount of talent available 

 if our manufacturers would only utilise it in the right 

 way. It has frequently been pointed out how, on the 

 Continent and in .\merica, the educational establishments 

 and the industries are brought into relationship by the 

 cooperation between the manufacturers and the teachers. 

 Here, so far as chemical industn,- is concerned, such co- 

 operation is practically unknown, and, as a consequence, 

 there exists more or less distrust where there should be 

 confidence, and both the educational and the industrial 

 sides of our subject are crippled. This is perhaps the most 

 powerful influence at worl< in this country in checking 

 that development which follows normaliv from cooperation 

 between the representatives of science and of industry. 



Checks to the Wastage of the Research Faculty; Research 

 Funds and Scholarships. 



Turning now from the consideration of the various 

 deterrent influences, we may in the next place deal with 

 such counteracting agencies as are available in this country. 

 It is clear, from our point of view, that any means by 

 which the research faculty, having once been captured, 

 can be given free scope for cJevelopment, must be a distinct 

 gain to our cause. All who have had to do with the 

 training of chemical students must in the course of their 

 experience have come across young men of exceptional 

 talent as original workers. We are concerned more 

 particularly with the utilisation of this faculty for the pro- 

 motion of our science and with the maintenance of the 

 principle that the submergence of this faculty means .so 

 much dead loss to the national resources. Now it un- 

 fortunately happens that many of the men thus gifted 

 come from stations in life which render it imperative that 

 they should proceed at once from the college to some 

 bread-winning occupation. A few may perhaps be lucky 

 enough to find appointments in which there is scope for 

 the development of their faculties, but I am afraid the 

 majority do not ; they undergo that process of extinction 

 as original workers which I have already dealt with. 

 One of the most valuable counteracting agencies, and one 

 the importance of which, from our standpoint, cannot be 

 overestimated, is that sj'stem of awarding research scholar- 

 ships to men of proved ability so as to enable them to 

 carry on original work after finishing their college train- 

 ing. The value of this most rational method of endowing 

 research is due mainly to the fact that the right men are 

 captured in the right way ; they are not, as it were, 

 squirted promiscuously out of an examination mould, but 

 they are selected by the teachers who have had them 

 under observation during the w^hole course of their train- 

 ing and who know their real as distinguished from their 

 examinational capabilities. 



The other agency working against the stream of adverse 



NO. 1966, vol. 76] 



influences is to be found in the various funds from which 

 grants are made to individual workers for the prosecution 

 of particular researches. There are three such funds avail- 

 able for the promotion of chemical research, the Govern- 

 ment Grant Fund of the Royal Society, the grants dis- 

 tributed annually by the British .Association, and the 

 income derived from our own research fund. Of these, 

 the two former have to be distributed over every branch 

 of science, and chemistry takes its chance with other 

 subjects. The total amount available for chemical research 

 is not very large, and all who have served on the com- 

 mittees of any of these funds knovf very well that the 

 amount applied for is generally much in excess of the 

 sum available for distribution. The main difficulty of 

 administration is, in fact, the equitable pruning of the 

 various applications. 



With regard to the results obtained through the research 

 fund of this society, the present occasion is in every way 

 opportune for directing attention to our achievements and 

 to our needs. The income derived from this fund has 

 hitherto enabled us to distribute annually a sum of about 

 220I. — a very modest amount considering the number of 

 claims and the activity of our workers. Of the value of 

 the assistance thus given we are, of course, all thoroughly 

 aware here, but it may not be generally realised by the 

 outer public what an enormous amount of good work is 

 being promoted by the judicious administration of this 

 very modest income. In order to get at the actual facts, 

 our assistant secretary, Mr. Carr, has been so good as to 

 prepare a table covering the eight years from 1898 to 

 iqoj inclusive, and setting forth for each year the sum 

 granted, the number of grantees, the total number of 

 papers published by the grantees in our Journal or else- 

 where, and other particulars which will be found in the 

 table itself. From this it appears that 151 grantees during 

 that period published 203 papers, thirteen failed to publish, 

 ten have not yet published, and eighteen grants are still 

 in the hands of the grantees. The total amount granted 

 was 1770!., so that for this expenditure we have actually 

 given to our science 203 papers, and more may be ex- 

 pected from those who still have grants in hand or who 

 have not yet published their results. The figures as ihey 

 stand, and even if nothing further is achieved, show that 

 the grants average from 8/. to 9?. per paper, and, as we 

 all know, each paper represents the results of at least 

 one and frequentiv of several years' work. It is not 

 going too far to say that there are no funds giving such 

 substantia! returns for so small an expenditure as thes 

 research funds, and their importance as aids to the 

 advancement of knowledge cannot be overestimated. 



With the additional capital by which our fund has beei 

 increased, the total income available for grants will be 

 about 330/. per annum. In view of the demands upon 

 that income ii is obvious that even now we are possessed 

 of but very limited means, and that the research fund 

 committee will still be compelled, as has hitherto been 

 the practice, to allot the grants for the purchase of 

 materials or special apparatus. But, in addition to the 

 promotion of research by the means indicated, there is 

 another, and, according to my view, an equally valuable 

 method, for assisting our workers in the prosecution of 

 their researches, and that is the allotment of person.i! 

 grants to enable the grantees to secure skilled assistance 

 — to purchase, in fact, the services of human material as 

 well as chemicals and apparatus. It is only want of 

 sufficient income that has hitherto debarred the use of our 

 fund in this way. I am so confident that an extension of 

 our means towards this end would be productive of a most 

 notable increase, both in the quantity and quality of the 

 chemical research done in this country, that I have no 

 hesitation in placing upon record the opinion that the 

 next step taken in the forward policy of the Chemical 

 Society ought to be in this direction. To do much good 

 in the way of making personal grants we should, of 

 course, require to capitalise a very Large sum ; we want 

 an income of thousands instead of hundreds, and I confess 

 that I see no immediate prospect of realising this dream. 

 But there can be no doubt that for those who have the 

 interests of our science at heart there could be no better 

 method of subsidising research. 



The general conclusion which appears to be justified 



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