Sept. 7, 1888.] 



SCIENTIFIC NEWS. 



•29 



intelligence, one cannot help feeling that the result is likely to be 

 intellectually lowering. Thus it is a sorry thing to see unintelligent 

 labour, even although that labour be useful. It is but one remove 

 from unintelligent labour which is not useful ; that kind of labour 

 generally appointed (by means of the tread-wheel or the crank) as a 

 punishment for crime. Consider even the honourable labour (for it 

 is useful, and it is honest) of the man who earns his livelihood by 

 turning the handle of a crane, and compare this with the labour of 

 a smith, who, while probably developing more energy by the use of 

 his muscles, than is developed by the man turning the crane-handle, 

 exercises at the same time the powers of judgment, of eye, and of 

 band in a manner which I never see without my admiration being 

 excited. I say that the introduction of prime movers as a mere 

 substitute for unintelligent manual labour is in itself a great aid to 

 civilisation and to the raising of humanity, by rendering it very diffi- 

 cult, if not impossible, for a human being to obtain a livelihood by 

 unintelligent work — the work of the horse in the mill, or of the 

 turnspit. 



But there are prime movers and prime movers — those of small 

 dimensions, and employed for purposes where animal power or 

 human power might be substituted, and those which attain ends that 

 by no conceivable possibility could be attained at all by the exertion 

 of muscular power. 



Compare a galley— a vessel propelled by oars — with the modern 

 Atlantic liner; and first let us assume that prime movers are non- 

 existent and that this vessel is to be propelled galley-fashion. Take 

 har length as some 600 feet, and assume that place be found for as 

 many as 400 oars on each side, each car worked by three men, or 

 2,400 men ; and allow that six men under these conditions could 

 develop work equal to one horse-power : we should have 400 horse- 

 power. Double the number of men, and we should have 800 

 horse-power, with 4,800 men at work, and at least the same number 

 in reserve, if the journey is to be carried on continuously. Contrast 

 the puny result thus obtained with the 19,500 horse-power given 

 forth by a large prime mover of the present day, such a power re- 

 quiring, on the above mode of calculation, 117,000 men at work and 

 117,000 in reserve ; and these to be carried in a vessel less than 600 

 feet in length. Even if it were possible to carry this number of men 

 in such a vessel, by no conceivable means could their power be 

 utilised so as to impart to it a speed of twenty knots an hour. 



This illustrates how a prime mover may not only be a mere substi- 

 tute for muscular work, but may afford the means of attaining an 

 end, that could not by any possibility be attained by muscular exer- 

 tion, no matter what money was expended or what galley-slave 

 suffering was inflicted. 



Take again, the case of a railway locomotive. From 400 to 600 

 horse-power developed in an implement which, even including its 

 tender, does not occupy an area of more than 50 square yards, and 

 that draws us at sixty miles an hour. Here again, the prime mover 

 succeeds in doing that which no expenditure of money or of life 

 could enable us to obtain from muscular effort. 



To what, and to whom, are these meritorious prime movers due? 

 I answer: to the application of science, and to the labours of the 

 Civil Engineer, using that term in its full and proper sense, as em- 

 bracing all engineering other than military. I am, as you know, a 

 Civil Engineer, and I desire to laud my profession and to magnify 

 mine office ; and I know of no better means of doing this than by 

 quoting to you the definition of " civil engineering " given in the 

 Charter of the Institution of Civil Engineers, namely, that it is 

 " the art of directing the great sources of power in Nature for the 

 use and convenience of man." These words are taken from a defi- 

 nition or description of engineering given by one of our earliest 

 scientific writers on the subject, Thomas Tredgold, who commences 

 that description by the words above quoted, and who, having given 

 various illustrations of the civil engineer's pursuits, introduces this 

 pregnant sentence : — 



"This is, however, only a brief sketch of the objects of civil 

 engineering, the real extent to which it may be applied is limited 

 only by the progress of science; its scope and utility will be in- 

 creased with every discovery in philosophy, and its resources with 

 every invention in mechanical or chemical art, since its bounds are 

 unlimited, and equally so must be the researches of its professors." 



" The art of directing the great sources of power in Nature for 

 the use and convenience of man." Among all secular pursuits, 

 can there be imagined one more vast in its scope, more beneficent, 

 and therefore more honourable, than this? There are those, I 

 know — hundreds, thousands — who say that such pursuits are not to 

 be named as on a par with those of literature ; that there is nothing 

 ennobling in them ; nothing elevating ; that they are of the earth, 

 earthy ; are mechanical, and are unintellectual, and that even the 

 mere bookworm, who, content with storing his own mind, neither 

 distributes those stores to others nor himself originates, is more 

 worthily occupied than is the civil engineer. 



I deny this altogether, and, while acknowledging, with gratitude, 

 that, in literature, the masterpieces of master minds have afforded, 

 and will afford, instruction, delight, and solace for all generations, 

 so long as civilisation endures, I say that the pursuits of civil 

 engineering are worthy of occupying the highest intelligence, and 

 that they are elevating and ennobling in their character. 



Remember the kindly words of Sir Thomas Browne, who said, 

 when condemning the uncharitable conduct of the mere bookworm, "I 

 make not, therefore, my head a grave, but a treasure of knowledge, 

 and study not for mine own sake only, but for those who study not 

 for themselves." The engineer of the present day finds that he 

 must not make his "head a grave," but that, if he wishes to 

 succeed, he must have, and must exercise scientific knowledge ; 

 and he realises daily the truth that those who are to come after him 

 must be trained in science, so that they may readily appreciate the 

 full value of each scientific discovery as it is made. Thus the 

 application of science by the engineer not only stimulates those 

 who pursue science, but adds him to their number. 



Holding, as I have said I do, the view that he who displaces 

 unintelligent labour is doing good to mankind, I claim for the 

 unknown engineer who, in Pontus, established the first water-wheel 

 of which we have a record, and for the equally unknown engineer 

 who first made use of wind for a motor, the title of pioneers in the 

 raising of the dignity of labour, by compelling the change from the 

 non-intelligent to the intelligent. 



With respect to these motors — wind and water — we have two 

 proverbs which discredit them — " Fickle as the wind," " Un- 

 stable as water." 



Something more trustworthy 'was needed — something that we 

 were sure of hiving under our hands at all times. As a result, 

 Science was applied, and the " fire " engine, as it was first called, 

 the "steam " engine, as it was renamed, a form of " heat " engine, 

 as we now know it to be, was invented. 



Think of the early days of the steam-engine — the pre-Watt days. 

 The days of Papin, Savory, Newcomen, Smeaton ! Great effects 

 were produced, no doubt, as compared with no fire-engine at all ; 

 effects so very marked as to extort from the French writer, Belidor, 

 the tribute of admiration he paid to the " fire " engine erected at 

 the Fresnes Colliery by English engineers. A similar engine 

 worked the pumps in York-place (now the Adelphi) for the supply 

 of water to portions of London. We have in his work one of the very 

 clearest accounts, illustrated by the best engravings (absolute work- 

 ing drawings), of the engine which had excited his admiration. 

 These drawings show the open-topped cylinder, with condensation 

 taking place below the piston, but with the valves worked auto- 

 matically. 



It need hardly be said that, noteworthy as such a machine was, 

 as compared with animal power, or with wind or water motors, it 

 was of necessity a most wasteful instrument as regards fuel. It is 

 difficult to conceive in these days how, for years, it could have been 

 endured that at each stroke of the engine the chamber that was to 

 receive the steam at the next stroke was carefully cooled down 

 beforehand by a water injection. 



Watt, as we know, was the first to perceive, or, at all events, to 

 cure, this fundamental error which existed prior to his time in the 

 " fire " engine. To him we owe condensation in a separate vessel, 

 the doing away with the open-topped cylinder, and the making the 

 engine double-acting ; the parallel motion ; the governor ; and the 

 engine indicator, by which we have depicted for us the way in which 

 the work is being performed within the cylinder. To Watt, also, 

 we owe that great source of economic working — the knowledge of 

 the expansive force of steam ; and to his prescience we owe the 

 steam jacket, without which expansion, beyond certain limits, is 

 practically worthless. I have said "prescience" — foreknowledge 

 — but I feel inclined to say that, in this case, prescience may be 

 rendered "pre-Science," for I think that Watt felt the utility of the 

 steam jacket, without being able to say on what ground that utility 

 was based. 



I have already spoken in laudatory terms of Tredgold, as being 

 one of the earliest of our scientific engineering writers, but, as 

 regards the question of steam jacketing, Watt's prescience was 

 better than Tredgold's science, for the latter condemns the steam 

 jacket, as being a means whereby the cooling surfaces are enlarged, 

 and whereby, therefore, the condensation is increased. 



I think it is not too much to say, that engineers who, since 

 Watt's days, have produced machines of such marvellous power — 

 and, compared with the engines of Watt's days, of so great economy 

 — have, so far as principles are concerned, gone upon those laid 

 down by Watt. Details of the most necessaiy character — necessary 

 to enable those principles to be carried out — have, indeed, been 

 devised since the days of Watt. Although it is still a very sad 

 confession to have to make, that the very best of our steam-engines 

 only utilises about one sixth of the work which resides (if the term 



