■October 4, 1895.] 



SGIENGE. 



431 



Robert Wei-e Fox, whose name is insepa- 

 rably connected with the early history of 

 terrestrial magnetism in - this countrj^ ; but 

 under such great financial difficulties that 

 the continuance of the work is seriously 

 jeopardised. It is to be hoped that means 

 may be forthcoming to carrj^ it on. Corn- 

 ishmen, indeed, could found no more fitting- 

 memorial of their distinguished country- 

 man, John Couch Adams, than by suitably 

 endowing the magnetic observatory in 

 which he took so lively an interest. 



Far more extended observation will be 

 needed before we can hope to have an es- 

 tablished theory as to the magnetism of the 

 earth. We are without magnetic observa- 

 tions over a large part of the southern 

 hemisphere. And Prof. Eilcker's recent 

 investigations tell us that the earth seems 

 as it were alive with magnetic forces, be 

 they due to electric currents or to varia- 

 tions in the state of magnetised matter; 

 that the disturbances affect not only the 

 diurnal movement of the magnet, but that 

 even the small part of the secular change 

 which has been observed, and which has 

 taken centuries to accomplish, is interfered 

 with by some slower agency. And, what 

 is more important, he tells us that none of 

 these observations stand as yet upon a firm 

 basis, because standard instruments have 

 not been in accord; and much labor, bej^ond 

 the power of individual effort, has hitherto 

 been required to ascertain whether the re- 

 lations between theui are constant or vari- 

 able. 



In electricity, in 1831, just at the time 

 when the British Association was founded, 

 Faraday's splendid researches in electricity 

 and magnetism at the Royal Institiition 

 had begun with his discovery of magneto- 

 electric induction, his investigation of the 

 laws of electro-chemical decomposition, and 

 of the mode of electrolytical action. But 

 the practical application of our electrical 

 knowledge was then limited to the use 



of lightning conductors for buildings and 

 ships. Indeed, it may be said that the ap- 

 plications of electricity to the use of man 

 have grown up side by side with the British 

 Association. 



One of the first practical applications of 

 Faraday's discoveries was in the deposition 

 of metals and electro-plating, which has 

 developed into a large branch of national 

 industry; and the dissociating effect of the 

 electric arc, for the reduction of ores, and 

 in other processes, is daily obtaining a 

 wider extension. 



But probably the application of electricity 

 which is tending to produce the greatest 

 change in our mental and even material 

 condition is the electric telegraph and its 

 sister, the telephone. By their agency not 

 only do we learn, almost at the time of 

 their occurrence, the events which are hap- 

 pening in distant parts of the world, but 

 they are establishing a community of 

 thought and feeling between all the nations 

 of the world which is influencing their at- 

 titude towards each other, and, we may 

 hope, may tend to weld them more and 

 more into one familj\ 



The electric telegraph was introduced 

 experimentally in Germany in 1833, two 

 years after the formation of the Association. 

 It was made a commercial success by Cooke 

 and Wheatstone in England, whose first at- 

 tempts at telegraphy were made on the line 

 from Euston to Camden Town in 1837, and 

 on the line from Paddington to West Dray- 

 ton in 1838. The submarine telegraph to 

 America, conceived in 1856, became a practi- 

 cal reality in 1866 through the commercial 

 energy of Cyrus Field and Pender, aided 

 by the mechanical skill of Latimer Clark, 

 Gooch and others, and the scientific genius 

 of Lord Kelvin. The knowledge of elec- 

 tricity gained by means of its aijplication 

 to the telegraph largely assisted the exten- 

 sion of its utilitj' in other directions. 



The electric light gives, in its incandes- 



