544 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XVI. No. 405. 



try of the antiquated adherence to rule of 

 thumb, which is at the root of much of the 

 backwardness we have to deplore. It 

 hardly needs to be pointed out to such an 

 audience as the present that chemists who 

 are neither graduates of a university, nor 

 holders of a diploma from a technical col- 

 lege, may be competent to carry on existing 

 processes according to traditional methods, 

 but are very unlikely to effect substantial 

 improvements, or to invent neAV and more 

 efficient processes. I am very far from de- 

 nying that here and there an individual may 

 be found whose exceptional ability enables 

 him to triumph over all defects of training. 

 But in all educational matters it is the 

 average man whom we have to consider, 

 and the average ability which we have to 

 develop. Now, to take the second point— 

 the actual money value of the industries 

 carried on in Germany by an army of 

 workers both quantitatively and qualita- 

 tively so superior to our own. The Con- 

 sular report estimates the whole vahie of 

 German chemical industries at not less than 

 fifty millions sterling per annum. These 

 industries have sprung up A'\dthin the last 

 seventy years, and have received enoniious 

 expansion during the last thirty. They 

 are, moreover, very largely founded upon 

 basic discoveries made by English chem- 

 ists, but never properly appreciated or 

 scientifically developed in the land of their 

 birth. I will place before you some figures 

 showing the growth of a single firm en- 

 gaged in a single one of these indi^stries — 

 the utilization of coal tar for the produc- 

 tion of drugs, perfumes and coloring- 

 matters of every conceivable shade. The 

 firm of Friedrich Bayer & Co. employed 

 in 1875, 119 workmen. The number has 

 more than doubled itself every five years, 

 and in May of this year that firm employed 

 5,000 workmen, 160 chemists, 260 engineers 

 and mechanics, and 680 clerks. For many 

 years past it has regularly paid 18 per 



cent, on the ordinary shares, which this 

 year has risen to 20 per cent.; and in ad- 

 dition, in common with other and even 

 larger concerns in the same industry, has 

 paid out of profits for immense extensions 

 usually charged to capital account. There 

 is one of these factories, the works and 

 plant of which stand in the books at 1,500,- 

 OOOL, while the money actually sunk in 

 them approaches to 5,000, OOOJ. In other 

 words, the practical monopoly enjoyed by 

 the German manufacturers enables them to 

 exact huge profits from the rest of the 

 world, and to establish a position which, 

 financially as well as scientifically, is. 

 almost unassailable. I must repeat that 

 the fundamental discoveries upon which 

 this gigantic industry is built were made 

 in this country, and were practically de- 

 veloped to a certain extent by their au- 

 thors. But in spite of the abundance and 

 cheapness of the raw material, and in spite 

 of the evidence that it could be most re- 

 muneratively worked up, these men 

 founded no school and had practically no 

 successors. The colors they made were- 

 driven out of the field by newer and better 

 colors made from their stuff by the de- 

 velopment of their ideas, but these im- 

 proved colors were made in Germany and 

 not in England. Now what is the explana- 

 tion of this extraordinary and disastrous 

 phenomenon? I give it in a word — want 

 of education. We had the material in 

 abundance when other nations had com- 

 paratively little. We had the capital, and 

 we had the brains, for we originated the 

 whole thing. But we did not possess the 

 diff'used education without which the ideas 

 of men of genius cannot fructify beyond 

 the limited scope of an individual. I am 

 aware that our patent laws are sometimes, 

 held responsible. Well, they are a con- 

 tributory cause; but it must be remem- 

 bered that other nations with patent laws, 

 as protective as could be desired have not 



