592 . EEPORT— 1901. 



of the community receive prompt attention without regard to the traditions and 

 doctrinaire principles of a past generation. In the matter of higher scientific 

 education, at any rate, it is becoming more and more widely recognised that its 

 starvation through attention being exclusively directed to the low-level education 

 of the masses is defeating the very ends which this policy has in view. Indeed, 

 some practical men, and even a few statesmen, realise that the many are beginning 

 to suffer from the results which this policy has had on our manufactures and com- 

 merce, without which the multitude can have no existence at all. 



The more than princely patronage of higher education by that Scotsman who has 

 not forgotten the land of his birth during fifty years spent in a country which has 

 afforded the necessary scope for his genius and energies illustrates the change in 

 the wind of opinion amongst practical men ; for Mr. Andrew Carnegie's handsome 

 contribution to the funds of the University of Birmingham, and his endowment of 

 the universities of Scotland on a scale which is altogether without precedent, 

 clearly show which, in his opinion, are the rungs in the educational ladder of this 

 country that require strengthening in the interest of those very masses which it is 

 his earnest desire to benefit. The still more recent response of the City Council 

 of Birmingham to Mr. Chamberlain's suggestion that a rate should be levied in 

 aid of the university of that city is further evidence that Mr. Carnegie's practically 

 expressed opinion is shared by the enlightened rulers of that great municipality to 

 which I have the privilege of belonging. 



These, ladies and gentlemen, are, I believe, no mere sporadic manifestations, but 

 unquestionably signs of the times. The opening of the new century is in reality 

 a year of very serious awakening to those Englishmen who are not deaf to the 

 voices in the air around them. It is rapidly dawning upon many that ' the 

 greatest empire which the world has ever seen ' cannot be maintained unless we 

 cast off" insular prejudices and traditions, and make a careful study of those points 

 in which other nations are our superiors, with a view to the intelligent adaptation 

 and development, as distinguished from mere imitation, of their methods to our 

 own particular needs. 



The survey of the British chemical world at the dawn of the twentieth century 

 affords, however, scope for satisfaction in many ways. Not only have the places 

 in which higher chemical work can be and actually is carried on been greatly 

 multiplied, but the number of workers has been largely increased ; and although 

 the enthusiasm of these workers cannot well be greater than that of those who 

 laboured so successfully twenty years and more ago, it has not become diminished, 

 and is certainly diffused more widely amongst the personnel of our colleges and 

 universities. In this connection I need only remind you of the large number of 

 active and independent investigators who are to be found amongst the members 

 of the junior staff" at almost every college in the country, and which is altogether 

 without parallel in the past. 



There are hardly any of the great problems now exeicising the minds of 

 chemists throughout the world which are not being worked at by some of our 

 number; whilst that some chapters in the recent progress of chemical science are 

 more or less specifically British, I would only remind you of the isolated labours of 

 Dr. Perkin in the field of magnetic rotatory power ; of Sir AVilliam Crookes's explo- 

 ration of the phenomena occurring in high vacua ; of the researches of Abney, 

 Russell, and Hartley on the absorption spectra of organic compounds ; of the 

 investigations by Harold Dixon and Brereton Baker of the behaviour of substances 

 in the complete absence of moisture ; of the extension by Pope and Smiles of 

 our knowledge of asymmetric atoms ; of the near approach to the absolute zero 

 of temperature by Dewar; and of those marvellous discoveries of Raleigh and 

 Ramsay which have not only introduced us to five new aerial elements, but have 

 revealed the existence of a hitherto unknown type of matter, which is apparently 

 incapable of entering into chemical combination at all. 



But whilst we may thus congratulate ourselves on this increased activity in 

 chemical investigation, and upon the maintenance of a high standard of quality by 

 the exceptional brilliancy of the researches of some of our number, we must now 

 carefully consider how we stand with regard to the absolute quantity of our output. 



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