August 15, 1884. 



SCIENCE. 



127 



the occurrence of actual tornadoes, his measure of 

 success will be directly apparent. G. 



THE NATIONAL CONFERENCE OF 

 ELECTRICIANS. 



The president of the United States, in pur- 

 suance of a special provision of congress, has 

 appointed a scientific commission, the com- 

 position of which we gave in No. 78, of which 

 Professor Rowland is chairman, and which may, 

 in the name of the United-States government, 

 conduct a national conference of electricians in 

 Philadelphia in the autumn of 1884. The law 

 creating the commission is as follows : " That 

 the president of the United States be, and 

 is hereby, authorized to appoint a scientific 

 commission which ma}*, in the name of the 

 United-States government, conduct a national 

 conference of electricians in Philadelphia in 

 the autumn of 1884 ; that said commission may 

 invite scientific men, native and foreign, to 

 participate in the conference, and may, in 

 general, determine the scope and character of 

 its work ; that the sum of seven thousand five 

 hundred dollars be appropriated to meet the 

 expenses of the commission in conducting the 

 conference and investigations, and to meet 

 the expenses of preparing reports of the same, 

 provided that the whole amount of the ex- 

 penses incurred by said commission shall not 

 exceed the said sum of seven thousand five 

 hundred dollars, and the members of said 

 commission shall not receive any compensation 

 for services." It is left to the discretion of 

 the commission to invite foreign scientific men 

 to join in the labors of the conference ; and the 

 United-States government does not dictate in 

 regard to the topics which are to be treated in 

 the conferences, further than to require that the 

 first meeting shall be held as early as Aug. 7, 

 1884. In the letter to each member of the 

 commission, apprising him of his appointment, 

 Secretary Frelinghuysen writes, " It is hardly 

 necessary to observe that this commission, ap- 

 pointed for high scientific purposes, will not 

 permit its influences to be exerted in behalf 

 of any person or company, manufacturers of 

 electrical apparatus or machines." 



The raison d'etre of this commission is the 

 conjunction of the electrical exposition in 

 Philadelphia with the meeting of the American 

 association of science in the same place, and 

 the meeting of the British association in Mon- 

 treal. It is hoped that a number of foreign 

 scientific men may be induced to deliberate 

 with the American commission upon more or 

 less international electrical questions. It is 

 thought by some that there is hardly need 

 of another conference of electricians. The 

 French conference has lately adjourned. Lord 

 Rayleigh has made an exhaustive determination 

 of the ohm. A standard of light has been 

 adopted which is the best that present experi- 

 ence indicates. The meteorological directions 

 of electrical science need time, and not confer- 

 ences, for their development ; and the protec- 

 tion of international cables and international 

 telegraphic relations was full}* considered in the 

 French conference. In answer to this view, 

 it must be pointed out that the mere assemblage 

 of those most interested and practised in any 

 department of science is necessary in the 

 present state of scientific research. There are 

 no ' gentle hermits ' in the subject of elec- 

 tricity ; and no one can hope to advance the 

 subject by working in a remote lighthouse or 

 on a desert island. There may be Victor 

 Hugos in poetiy and fiction, but not in elec- 

 tricity. 



It is possible that American science ma}* 

 enlighten foreign science, even on such trite 

 subjects as the ohm and the standard of light. 

 There is, moreover, the adoption of the elec- 

 tric light by the American lighthouses, and a 

 report upon the uses of electricity in connec- 

 tion with torpedo warfare, — a subject, when 

 it is considered that torpedoes constitute our 

 principal means of harbor defence, of especial 

 interest in the coming presidential election. 

 The imagination needs only a slight stimulation 

 to perceive that the government can reasonably 

 expect as great a return for the sum of seven 

 thousand five hundred dollars invested in an 

 electrical conference, as it can hope to have 

 from the same sum expended in improving 

 the harbor of Podunk. 



