PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 453 
and thoroughly versed in the art of inquiry. The men who in my experience 
have been successful are those who have learnt to think for themselves and 
who have been capable independent workers—sufliciently broad-minded and 
sufficiently practised in their art to be able to turn their attention in any 
desired direction ; I should add that they have been men who have acquired 
that neglected art, the art of reading. Much has been said and written of 
late on the subject of technical training which is of value as bringing out 
the various points of view; the problem is a very difficult one, owing to the 
great number of interests to be considered, and more especially the very 
uneven and often inferior quality of the material to be trained. The great 
danger of specialised technical training is the tendency to make it too 
narrow. Success in practice depends not merely on knowledge of subject 
but also, if not mainly, on the possession of certain human qualities which 
are not usually developed in the technical school and which cannot be tested 
by examination. It is unnecessary to specify them. It is undeniable that 
in England for many years past chemistry has suffered from the recognised 
fact that there has been little money in it—parents have been led therefore 
to prefer other careers for their sons and the subject has not secured its due 
proportion of intelligence and is suffering in consequence. Too many of 
those who have entered works have had neither the intelligence nor—to 
speak plainly—the presence and manners that are required to secure confi- 
dence. The presence of men of gentlemanly bearing and instincts, who have 
received thorough training in science, is urgently needed at the present time 
in many of our manufacturing establishments, to take the place of foremen 
of the old type, who have learnt all they know in the works and whose 
conceptions necessarily lack breadth ; it is almost impossible to convince such 
men that improvements are possible; too often they adopt a selfish attitude 
and advisedly retard progress. Another direction in which an approach of 
interests is required is between chemist and engineer. The latter has too 
long occupied a dominant position in many works, and in not a few cases 
has done his utmost to exclude the chemist, fearing his competition ap- 
parently. The gas industry perhaps affords the most striking illustration 
of the effects of such a policy: on the engineering side it has been carried to 
a high pitch of perfection but on the chemical it has ever fallen, year 
after year, to a lower state; now the quality of coal gas is such, especially 
since the withdrawal of the sulphur clauses from the Acts of Parliament 
by which the industry is regulated, that gas is almost unusable.* 
But the iron industry is an even more striking case. The appliances 
are wonderful examples of constructive skill but the engineer is clearly 
nonplussed when he seeks to understand the processes he nominally 
controls; the chemist has been kept so closely confined to his bench in tho 
laboratory that he has had no proper opportunity of studying the processes 
of manufacture systematically. No systematic study of steel has yet been 
made! Considering the magnitude of the industry and its importance, 
our knowledge of the subject is phenomenally slight; what we do know 
*Had not chemists entirely unconnected with the industry vastly improved 
the methods of burning it, gas would long since have fallen into disuse. At last, 
when almost too late, the industry is taking some notice of our science. It needs 
reformation and reorganisation root and branch. That an industry should exist 
whose business it is to sell, as the primary product of manufacture, so minor a 
constituent of coal as the gas we burn is an anachronism. We should gain vastly 
in our cities if we burnt soft coke instead of smoke-yielding coal. Lastly, it is 
now imperative that none of the valuable constituents of coal should be wasted. 
Combining these three considerations, it is obviously desirable that, in future, 
all coal should be coked and both gas and coke supplied to the public instead, 
whilst the valuable residuals are used in other ways. No improvement has been 
effected by municipalities who have taken over the supply of gas; in the public 
interest some of these might well initiate such a change as is here suggested. 
