PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 



By 0. O. Burge, m. inst. c.e., Telford Medallist, Inst. C.E. 



[Read before the Royal Society of N. 8. Wales, December 7, 1904.~] 



As to the main subject of my address, I have been con- 

 fronted with the usual difficulty of choosing it. Ordinarily, 

 the annual address has been either a resume, during a 

 definite period, of the work of science generally, or of that 

 section of it with which the avocations of the particular 

 president befits him best to deal. The first method neces- 

 sarily involves a good deal of second hand information, 

 given by one who is necessarily not an expert in all, and as 

 it is, of course, a large subject, dealt with in a compara- 

 tively small space, it must be scrappy and unsatisfactory. 

 Such a treatment of the subject would be like the discharge 

 from an ancient bell mouthed blunderbuss, which scatters 

 all round, but hits nobody very effectively. The alternative 

 of dealing with the president's own speciality may be com- 

 pared to the bullet from the modern rifle, which deals with 

 one object effectively, but leaves the rest untouched. Such 

 special subjects had best be left to the annual addresses of 

 the chairmen of the Sections of this Society, which its 

 hospitable policy throws open to all branches of science. 



Between this Scylla and Oharybdis, however, there is a 

 middle course, which, unlike such generally, is not a weak 

 one, owing to two recent facts to which I shall presently 

 refer. The subject I have chosen is the connexion between 

 Engineering and Science, as a whole, and the two facts 

 just mentioned which have brought this connexion into 

 prominence, are firstly, the establishment of examinations 

 in scientific subjects, by the Institution of Civil Engineers, 

 as a condition of entry, and secondly, the cordial recognition 



A— Dec. 7, 1904. 



