G.— ENGINEERING 155 



Of equal importance is the work carried on in the various research 

 bodies under the management of the great scientific institutions. These 

 again are largely co-operative in their aim. Some, indeed, as for instance 

 the Research and Standardisation Committee of the Institution of Auto- 

 mobile Engineers, are affiliated to the Department of Scientific and 

 Industrial Research as Research Associations, and receive the Department's 

 £1 for £1 contribution to their funds. 



Nearly all the Universities now have research departments, which not 

 only carry out practical work of importance, but also act as training 

 centres for students who are to make research work their livelihood ; 

 while as already mentioned private research laboratories are maintained 

 by the more important and wealthier firms — as well as by quite humble 

 businesses. Their primary object is naturally the furthering of private 

 interests, but they are not entirely isolated units. Many such research 

 departments belong to one or other of the Research Associations and 

 frequently pass on problems of a fundamental nature to them to deal 

 with. AH can work in contact and correspondence with the Department 

 of Scientific and Industrial Research — if they desire. 



I have tried to indicate the rise, growth, and present state of research 

 in this country. Some idea of the recency of its growth may be gained 

 from the fact that in the eleventh edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 

 published in 1910, the subject receives rather less than half a paragraph. 



The early years of the twentieth century saw on the whole much greater 

 research activity abroad and in America than here. It is quite impossible 

 to enter on any account of these, but I might mention that the National 

 Academy of Sciences, was founded in the U.S.A. as early as 1863, to deal 

 with all phases of national research ; and its influence in the United States 

 is comparable to that of the Royal Society in our own country. In 1916 

 the Academy created the National Research Council to assist Government 

 in organising the scientific resources of the country, which proved of such 

 great service during the period of the Great War that it was decided to 

 maintain it as a permanent organisation. One of its main branches was 

 that of Engineering and Industrial Research. 



The first years of the new century, also as with us, saw the setting up 

 of the National Bureau of Standards by the United States Government, 

 which covers an immense field and whose technical bulletins and other 

 publications are the means of making widely known many of the latest 

 scientific discoveries. America has indeed always been forward in pro- 

 moting international standardisation in engineering and co-operation in 

 research work, considering that the two matters must run together — as is 

 so. The Bureau of Standards includes as part of its organisation a close 

 co-operation with the research department of the Universities and other 

 institutions in every State. 



In America, too, industry and manufacture have taken a leading part 

 in the research movement, and some of their great laboratories eclipse 

 our own in size. The United States have developed a form of co-opera- 

 tive research of their own, of which the Mellon Institute is the best 



