xliv 
REPORT— 1847* 
soeciraen of the information conveyed from the liouse is the following:— 
“ Committee has permission to sit until five o’clock and among the qnes- 
tions sent down from tlie committee are the following:—“ What is before 
the House?” “Who is speaking?” “ How long before the House divides?” 
Even if I possessed in myself or had collected from others, the materials 
for the most rapid sketch of the progress of other acicnces, the time would 
fail me in the attempt to convey it to you. I abstain from any reference to 
Geology, principally from my own ignorance of its later progress: but, 
perhaps, the omission will likewise be acceptable to the Association on an¬ 
other ground, namely, that the subject was fully reviewed last year by my 
distinguished predecessor in his address at Southampton. I can as little 
endeavour to bring before the Association the discoverien during the past 
year by which science has mintstertNl to the arts or to commerce; vet I 
cannot leave altogether unnamed—though 1 can hardly do more tb.in name 
-—the discovery of the gun-cotton, to which, indeed, Sir Iloderick Murchison 
adverted in 1846, and the application of electricity to the smelting of copper- 
I’or that process, I believe, a patent has been rrccntly taken out. As 
yet, perhaps, sufficient time has not elapsocl to teat its full value. We all 
know that an experiment succeeds perfecUy in the case of a model, or in a 
Jaboratory, which may not succeed so perfectly when the miniature steam- 
engine, tor example, is extended to its ordinary size in a manufactory, or 
when the operation is transferred from ounces to tons. Jiui if the hope*- 
expectationsandconlidonce of the discoverers be realized, their plan 
v^lue proportionate 
nelriv p’® importnut roloniVs. It ap/iears. that 
SyraditfninrJ r.^^^ vvere sent last year from Soiul. Australia and 
for i,h.r purno;« of c 
rroin me sciences cultivated .. , 
sideratioD of the Association ii8f*l/ T» ° ‘-‘“<^«'^raged, I advert to a con- 
national. Their direct results Inve b i.”* " 
their iiidireet effecis. b. _‘ , L‘»n‘nently beneficial to science- 
their indirect effects, iu unitimr ni'i.n vminontly beneficial to science- 
of our common country, and not less in hrS"-'' differem part® 
and empires divide, but whom the sanie^y^f'r^ together those whom sea» 
mates as in this place, are equally remarkable 
use too strong a word! whif*?, rnarkabk. I hose .'intipalhies (I hardlf 
realms, and f?om whieVte.; r! our brethren in other 
year by year vanishing; and we hav..*m^?^ "*** airways exempt, »re 
assist and encourage one another in il cordially on common ground 
viceable to the wlfole fhmfiy o^man ' honourable and scr- 
ford or in Cambridge'* n^EdinbiirS?'’^^^^^ whether our meetings be in O^' 
or again, whether ttV L in En<d-.nT Liverpool or in Cork^ 
819 tons of luctal 
