872 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIV. No. 362. 



important investigations relating to electric 

 units and to his appointment as one of the 

 United States delegates at important inter- 

 national conventions for the better deter- 

 mination and definition of these units. In 

 1883 a committee appointed by the Electric- 

 al Congress of 1881, of which Eowland 

 was a member, adopted 106 centimeters as 

 the length of the mercury column equiva- 

 lent to the absolute ohm, but this was done 

 against his protest, for his own measure- 

 ments showed that this was too small by 

 about three- tenths of one per cent. His 

 judgment was confirmed by the Chamber 

 of Delegates of the International Congress 

 of 1893, of which Eowland was himself 

 president, and by which definitive values 

 were given to a system of international 

 units. 



Rowland's interest in applied science can- 

 not be passed over, for it was constantly 

 showing itself, often, perhaps, unbidden, an 

 unconscious bursting forth of that strong 

 engineering instinct which was born in him, 

 to which he often referred in familiar dis- 

 course and which would unquestionably 

 have brought him great success and dis- 

 tinction had he allowed it to direct the 

 course of his life. Although everywhere 

 looked upon as one of the foremost expo- 

 nents of pure science, his ability as an engi- 

 neer received frequent recognition in his 

 appointment as expert and counsel in some 

 of the most important engineering opera- 

 tions in the latter part of the century. He 

 was an inventor, and might easily have 

 taken first rank as such had he chosen to 

 devote himself to that sort of work. Dur- 

 ing the last few years of his life he was 

 much occupied with the study of alternat- 

 ing electric currents and their application 

 to a system of rapid telegraphy of his own 

 invention. A year ago his system received 

 the award of a grand prix at the Paris Ex- 

 position, and only a few weeks after his 

 death the daily papers published cablegrams 



from Berlin announcing its complete suc- 

 cess as tested between Berlin and Hamburg, 

 and also the intention of the German Postal 

 Department to make extensive use of it. 



But behind Rowland, the profound 

 scholar and original investigator, the engi- 

 neer, mechanician and inventor, was Row- 

 land the man, and any estimate of his 

 influence in promoting the interests of 

 physical science during the last quarter of 

 the nineteenth century would be quite 

 inadequate if not made from that point of 

 view. Born at Honesdale, Pennsylvania, 

 on November 27, 1848, he had the misfor- 

 tune, at the age of eleven years, to lose his 

 father by death. This loss was made good, 

 as far as it is possible to do so, by the 

 loving care of mother and sisters during the 

 years of his boyhood and youthful manhood. 

 From his father he inherited his love for 

 scientific study, which from the very first 

 seems to have dominated all his aspira- 

 tions, directing and controlling most of his 

 thoughts. His father, grandfather and 

 great-grandfather were all clergymen and 

 graduates of Yale College. His father, who 

 is described as one ' interested in chemistry 

 and natural philosophy, a lover of nature 

 and a successful trout-fisherman,' had felt, 

 in his early youth, some of the desires and 

 ambitions that afterward determined the 

 career of his distinguished son, but yield- 

 ing, no doubt, to the influence of family 

 tradition and desire, he followed the lead 

 of his ancestors. 



It is not unlikely , and it would not have 

 been unreasonable, that similar hopes were 

 entertained in regard to the future of young 

 Henry, and his preparatory- school work 

 was arranged with this in view. Before 

 being sent away from home, however, he 

 had quite given himself up to chemical ex- 

 periments, glass-blowing and other similar 

 occupations, and the members of his family 

 were often summoned by the enthusiastic 

 boy to listen to lectures which were fully 



