242 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
liimself manufacturing a substance that might well replace decaying 
stone. It is already being made on a large scale, some of the work of 
the stations of the Metropolitan Railway recently opened being con- 
structed of it. 
It may well be supposed that unsinkable ships, projectiles and guns, and 
iron plates, would not escape discussion. Much good sense was shown in dis- 
cussion, but there did not seem any very new views, the general conclusion 
being that the gun, as at present used, can throw a projectile that shall 
penetrate any armour hitherto made. 
Two excursions were made during the meeting. One, by the Geologists 
and Naturalists, to Hunstanton, in Norfolk, where there is an interesting 
cliff showing the bottom beds of the chalk, and the rocks coming out 
from beneath, and where some good fossils have been obtained. The 
other was by the Mechanical Section; the object being to see the works 
now nearly brought to a conclusion that are intended to remedy the evils 
caused by the recent destruction of the Middle Level sluice and the 
flooding of the Fens. A few hours after the party had left the Fens, 
another similar accident occurred, on a smaller scale than the first acci- 
dent; but still one that it would have been interesting to witness in its 
early stages. 
The work of the general committee at the meetings of the Association 
involves the confirming the suggestions and reports of the council and the 
committees of recommendations, and the selection of the place of the next 
ensuing meeting. The money grants made at Cambridge were somewhat 
large, amounting to nearly £2,000. Of this sum the Kew Observatory, 
as usual, absorbs the lion’s share. There is, perhaps, no work undertaken 
by the Association that has borne better or more important fruit than that 
connected originally with Terrestrial Magnetism, and afterwards carried 
over all departments of Meteorology. When the Association was originated 
at York, in 1832, the science of Meteorology was barely recognized. It 
has grown and flourished under the auspices, and has always been an 
enfant clieri , of the governing body at each successive meeting. Terres- 
trial Magnetism and Meteorology are, indeed, the branches of modern 
science that owe most to the Association ; and when we say that nearly £1 , 000 
were appropriated, at Cambridge, to keep up the Kew establishment and 
assist in investigations in the department of physics, including balloon 
observations, it will be evident that there is no falling off in this direction. 
Other grants are by tens, but these by hundreds ; and, so long as there 
are no other means available, it is fortunate for the reputation of British 
science that such is the case. 
The position of the Association has greatly changed since the time 
when its meetings (then, at most, amounting to a few hundred members) 
were greeted with ridicule, and when its efforts were regarded as useless. 
It has long since fought its way to a position which enables it to command 
the attention of the Government when any important scientific object is to 
be attained, and by its Parliamentary Committee, and its Permanent 
Council, acting in concert with the Royal Society, it has already done much 
good. That the direct results have not been even greater, is not because its 
members have been idle. It is but a short time since the reasonable 
