I 



THE FOURTH INDIAN SCIENCE CONGRESS, 



BANGALORE, JANUARY 1917. 



The Fourth Indian Science Congress was held in Bangalore 

 on January 10th, 11th, 12th and 13th, 1917, under the presi- 



Bourne 



The meet- 



ing was attended by about 270 members and some 70 papers 

 were communicated, abstracts of which are given below. 



The Patron of the Congress, H.H. the Maharajah of My- 

 sore. Gr.C.S.L, was present at the opening meeting and welcomed 

 the visitors in a felicitous speech. 



Presidential Address. 



By Sir Alfred Gibbs Bourne, D.Sc, F.R.S., K.C.LE. 

 Your Highness, 



My first duty is the very pleasant one of saying, on be- 

 half of the members of this Congress, how much we value the 

 honour Your Highness has done us in consenting to be our 

 Patron and in coming here to preside at our opening meeting. 

 Many of our members have come from distant parts of India 

 and are paying their first visit to the State of Mysore ; the in- 

 terest of this visit is greatly enhanced by the pleasure of seeing 

 Your Highness in person. 



Ladies and Gentlemen, 



Before going further may I say how greatly I appre- 

 ciate the honour of my new position as President of this Con 

 gress, a most unexpected honour as it is now fifteen years since 

 1 was caught up by the great wheels of administration and had 

 during that time very little leisure or energy to devote to 

 scientific work. This is one reason among others why I cannot 

 follow in the footsteps of my distinguished predecessor and offer 

 you, as he did. an intellectual treat. 



I had, at first, hoped it would be possible for me to attempt 

 some review of the history of science in India ; and though I 

 have been compelled to give up that idea as impracticable, T 

 should like to express my gratitude to Mr. K. V. Bangaswami 

 Aiyengar of Trivandrum for the notes which he kindly compiled 

 for me on the science handed down to us in Sanskrit literature. 

 I make one quotation from these notes now : its bearing on my 

 own remarks will be evident later. After pointing out that no 

 cientific treatises in Sanskrit have come down which deal with 

 the subject matter of any of the Physical Sciences in the direct 

 modern manner, he says : " Even in such cases as those of 

 fndian Astronomy and Mathematics, we find the purely scienti- 



