30 Electricity as an Illuminant 



ammeters, which had ceased to register the amount of current 

 passing through them. It is hardly necessary to say that this 

 defect was speedily remedied. There is no doubt that the cost 

 of electric lighting for domestic purposes is in large towns higher 

 than the cost of gas. It is at least twice, and in some instances 

 two and a half times as dear. There are however many advan- 

 tages possessed by electric light over gas. Convenience is 

 undoubtedly one of these advantages. You enter a sitting 

 room, drawing room, or library, and you switch on the light at 

 the door. If you leave the room for five or ten minutes you 

 can switch the light off. If you were burning gas in the same 

 place the chances are you would not take the trouble to turn 

 off the gas for brief periods. The electric light is also much 

 healthier. The Postmaster-General has found that he saves 

 ;^6oo per annum at the General Post Office in London because 

 of the smaller number of absentees through illness, and he has 

 introduced electric light in Bradford and other places, where he 

 finds similar good results. I wish to refer to an aspect of the 

 question which has been overlooked, viz., the possibility of 

 electricity being used for cooking and domestic purposes. 

 There are radiators by which rooms can be heated by means of 

 electricity, there is a great variety of cooking apparatus, and I 

 have seen electric cigar lighters. Although at the present time 

 such domestic arrangements are expensive, the electrical 

 engineers are confident that in a few years there will be great 

 improvements, and that electric cooking, heating, and lighting 

 will be great accomplished facts. 



Professor FitzGerald — It seems to me that in effect Mr. 

 Perry's proposition of supplying electricity at a charge of 3d. 

 per unit amounts in reality to a charge of probably 4^d. or 5d. 

 per unit when the installation is put in, for this reason, that Mr. 

 Perry limited himself to 3d. a unit subject to the proviso that 

 the density ol supply should correspond to the number of gas- 

 lights per yard of gas main in the same district. I consider 

 that the additional cost of electric lighting ought not to be a 

 barrier to its employment ; it is really a matter of paying a 

 higher price for a light of higher quality, apart from quantity. 



