October 25, 1895.] 



SCIENCE. 



539 



also by stimulating the search for new ele- 

 ments and the efforts to ascertain the true 

 relation of those already known. In this 

 sense the present year may well mark the 

 beginning of a new era in chemical discov- 

 ery. H. N. Stokes. 

 Washington, October, 1895. 



ECONOMICS OF ENGINEERING PUBLIC 

 WORKS. 



It has become almost proverbial that the 

 inhabitants of new countries are in many 

 respects lavish and extravagant. Our Puri- 

 tan forefathers were undoubtedly the most 

 rigorous and economical people that ever 

 faced privation and hardship, yet it can 

 hardly be gainsaid that their descendants 

 have lost that characteristic of frugality to 

 such an extent as to make the American 

 people distinguished for extravagance and 

 prodigality ; notably so in this nineteenth 

 century. As a people we have not spent 

 our wealth on the fine arts, but on silks and 

 velvets for clothing, on diamonds and jew- 

 elry for adornment, on luxeries in food and 

 drink, and in similar indulgences of a low 

 order, and we are now beginning to feel the 

 €vil results of this course of action. 



This lavish expenditure of money has 

 been made possible by the great accumula- 

 tion of wealth resulting from the natural 

 resources of the land, the wealth of the 

 soil, of the forests, of the mines, and from 

 the labor and frugality of the pioneers. 

 We, of this generation, not onlj' have felt 

 no need to practice the economies familiar 

 to other countries, but we have been im- 

 pelled by the consciousness of our national 

 and personal possessions to make use of 

 them in what has often been vain and ex- 

 travagant display. 



Then again, this general success in the 

 battle of life has made individuals self-re- 

 liant, or rather has prevented that feeling 

 of the need of cooperation which only 

 lately has shown signs of existence. There 



was a time when men rose unaided to the 

 top round of financial success, made their 

 own fortunes, and spent them as their tastes 

 dictated ; individuals hired individuals, 

 and laborers worked for this man or for 

 that, as fa.ncy or personal preference led 

 them ; but not now. By means of coopera- 

 tion and combination with others, man is 

 enabled to have advantages which, as an 

 individual, he cannot secure ; for we have 

 begun to act on the principle that, while 

 one man's opinions may be ignored, there 

 is power in the expressed wish of numbers. 

 Trusts and brotherhoods are alike in trying 

 to secure some advantage for their individ- 

 ual members to the exclusion of the rest of 

 the world. Man has reached a point where 

 he sees that to benefit himself he must be 

 willing to help a few others as well. One 

 step has been taken away from individ- 

 ualism, but only one, and that a short 

 one. Let us look at some instances of cor- 

 porations and associations seeking their 

 own advantage at the expense of the public 

 good. This is sometimes done wilfully, in 

 the face of public needs and desires, and' 

 sometimes through blindness and ignorance. 

 There are in the United States thousands 

 of miles of railroad which have been use- 

 lessly built. The money for their construc- 

 tion has been practically taken out of the 

 store of the world's wealth and literally 

 buried in the ground. They have been 

 built either by shortsightedness or by knav- 

 ishness on the part of a few, and can only 

 be maintained by a higher rate on all rail- 

 road business, and a correspondingly in- 

 creased tax on all who use the railroads. 

 ISTo one would hesitate to say that were the 

 New York Central Eailroad, for example, 

 to have all the freight business between 

 New York and Buffalo, instead of having 

 to divide with its competing roads, the rate 

 per ton on freight would be greatly lowered 

 and yet a working profit be maintained. 

 Aside, then, from the local business, which 



