340 REPORT — 1873. 



gress of art and manufacture has depended, and will depend, upon successful dis- 

 coveries which in their inception were, and will be schemes, just as much as were 

 those discoveries that have been, and will be, unfruitfid ; but the successful dis- 

 coveries, because they are successful, are taken out of the category of schemes 

 wheu years of untiring application on the part of the inventors have, so to speak, 

 thrust them down the throat of the unwilling practical man. Take the instance of 

 Mr. Bessemer, who was beset for years by diiiiculties of detail in his great 

 scheme of improvement in the manufacture of steel. As long as he was so beset, 

 the practical men chorused, "he is a schemer; he is one of the schemers; it is a 

 scheme." 



Supposing that these practical difficulties had beaten Mr. Bessemer, and that they 

 had not been overcome to this day, the practical man would have derided him still 

 as a schemer, although the theory and groundwork of his invention would have been 

 as true uuder these circumstances as it now is. Fortunately for the world, and 

 happily for him, he was able to overcome these most vexatious hindrances, and 

 make his invention that which it is. No one now dares to apply the term " schemer" 

 to Mr. Bessemer, or " scheme" to his invention ; but it is as true now that he is a 

 " schemer," and his invention a " scheme," as it would have been had he failed up to 

 the present to conc[uer the minor difficulties. It is a species of profanation to sug- 

 gest, but I must suggest it, for it is true, that Watt, Stephenson, Faradav, and 

 almost every other name among the honoured dead to whose inventive genius we 

 owe the development that has taken place within the last century in all the luxuries, 

 the comforts, even the bare necessities, of our daily existence, would in their day, 

 and while struggling for success, have been spoken of as schemers, even in respect 

 of those very inventions of which we are now euj oying the fruits. I3ut I feel I need 

 not labour this point further at a Meeting of the Mechanical Section of the British 

 Association, — an Association established for the Advancement of Science. 



I know 1 shall be accused of decrving the practical man, and of upholding the 

 " schemers." I say most emphatically that I do not decry the practical man. I 

 plead guilty to the charge of decrying the miscalled practical man, and I glory iu 

 my guilt, while I readily accept that which I consider the praise of upholding 

 ''schemers;" and I do so for this simple reason, that if there were no schemers 

 there would be no improvement. 



I think it becomes a scientific bod}' like the British Association to laud tlie 

 generous effi)rts of the unsuccessful inventor, rather than to encourage the cold sel- 

 fishness of the man who stands by and sees others endeavour to raise the structure 

 of improvement without lending a hand to help, and even sneers at the builders, 

 but when the structure is fully raised and solidly established, claims to come in to 

 inhabit, and, being in, probably essays, cuckoo-hke, to oust the builders and to take 

 possession for his own benefit. 



One word in conclusion. Can we not devise some means by which consumers of 

 coal may be instructed in, shamed into, or tempted to the economical use of that 

 most valuable material ? 



The Royal Agricultural Society of England, by its judicious efforts for many 

 years past, by the institution of trials and the giving of prizes for the best engines, 

 has brought the consumption of coal down from 10 lbs. per horse-power to a little 

 over one quarter of that quantity. 



Could we not institute a society which should devote itself to the recording 

 and the rewarding of the performances of steamboats, and of fixed engines for land- 

 purposes ? 



1 am aware it is supposed there is a difficulty in these cases which does not ob- 

 tain in the case of portable engines that can be brought for trial upon a d;sTiamo- 

 meter, and that is that the power exerted by marine engines varies during the 

 voyage, and is not that which is developed at the measured mile ; while in a manu- 

 factory it varies according to the conditions of the trade, and to the extent to which 

 the British workman condescends to attend to his work. 



But there are implements which record the horse-power exerted from moment 

 to monient, and register it on indices as readable as those of an ordinary counter of 

 an engine, or as those of a gas-meter. 

 . I believe that one of the very greatest incentives to economical working which 



