The Express.
London, England, 1864-09-19 00:00:00

LONDON, MONDAY EVENING, SEPTh.MBER 19, 1864.

THE BRITISH ASSOCIATION.

(TROY •

BATH, Sen. 17.

Professor Rosooe's lecture, which I may prc-
nounce at once perfect in its way, opened with his
pointing to "conservation of energy" (force it has
been called) as the principle the gradual establish-
ment of which shows the direction in which modern
science is progressing. Had the learned Professor
entered the theatre by the pit he would have
observed a most extraordinary illustration of the
profound truth which he expounded to us ; he would
have beheld the thousand and thirty-six ladies and
the thousand and sixty-nine associate gentlemen
agglomerated about the closed doors of the theatre—
boxes, pit, and gallery. For a long half hour the
human particles remained in a state of quiescence,
precisely like the professor's two pans in-
clined to unite in the glass globule, but
waiting for the touch of light ; but at the instant of
the unlocking of the door all conservation of
energy was at an end. There was an absolutely
irresistible and immeasurable expenditure of force
in every direction, and it was amazing to see the
science displayed, not in any of the Ologies,
but in the noble art ; it was a grand attack,
in fact, upon a breach obstinately defended
by the two policemen inside the fort, who
availed themselves of every advantage
of position. These two brave keepers of the peace
certainly fought admirably, but in the mete they
were beaten, and the " squash" became general.
The house was taken by a breathless and fearfully
aggravated mob of the elite of the middle classes.
Panting Beauties soon appeared in the back of the pit
looking unutterable miseries ; to one of these fragile
creatures in muslin gallantry led me to suggest that
the dress circle was a safer and a more comfortable
place ; the answer—" oh, no, it's dreadful ! we've
been nearly killed there "—cost me my seat for the
evening. Well, this may give some idea of the
interest excited about seeing the spectral analysis of
metals and the burning of the new metal wire,
which they say is to supersede gas, if not
sunlight. Imagine having a coil of this fine
wire which is about the thickness of a pin,
which you can ignite with a inciter match, and
light up a hall-room splendidly. Just now the
cost is threepence a foot, but the Magnesium Com-
pany (Limited) will no doubt h►ve to conic down
in their price, and then the wire will become au
article of household consumption. Only conceive
Davy's delight if he could have made the two
twenty pound weight lumps of magnesium. This
wire burning is an example of the conservation • of
light ;—shall we ever be provided by science with a
more concentrated and cleaner form of couservated
beat than coal 1 Surely, if heat' is only a mode
of 'motion,' as the philosophers tell us, this is
not asking too much. One thing struck
me in looking at the diagrams showing
the difference in the chemical power of
daylight in Manchester and in Heidelberg, which is
very great—that as this great centre of smoke is a
moat unhealthy place, and as all the North of Eug.
land, indeed, lies under a more or lees dense and
deadly cloud, and is proportionably destructive to
animal and, vegetable life, has not this want of
sunlight a great deal to do with the unhealthiness '1
Ought we not, therefore, to take Sir William Arm-
strong's hint, given last year at Newcastle, and utilise
this smoke t To do this would be at the same
time to let in the wholesome sunlight to strengthen
the body, cheer the heart of the workers of the
North, and, as the phrase is, "answer the purpose"
of the manufacturers !

The Spectral Analysis is a much more evident and
simple matter than most people expected. The
beautiful streaks oflcolour in the spectrum, which in
simple words is a cut out of a rainbow, made by send-
ing the rays of artificial light through a glass prism
on to a white screen, are nearly as broad as the hand
and exceedingly.bright, especiallyithose from burn-
ing the metals magnesium, brass, and copper, toge-
ther ; and Thelievethoee:which are produced by.tbe
sun's rays are very distinctly seen ; sand correspond
in colour exactly to Siam; produced' artificially.;
hence the conclusion that thei:Sun it burning the
same metals.

" Doing the Sections " is the grades ad srientiam
which all the ladies, and the glorious old on77y
'gentlemen of Somerset who are, their kcavatiers,
conscientiously attempt to ascend. It is a:subject
to me ofgprofound reflection how it is that the
female mind is so affected ; can it be
that they think there must be some secret
which we don't want them to know, and so
they are all the more determined to find it out 1 How.
ever it is, their pertinacity is wonderful No matter
what Section room'you enter, there are the ladies—
even in the Physiological I counted six of a oertain
dark-robed and solemn species (and two wore
Quaker bonnets)—listening; with intent to a paper
lon muscular irritability, and other papers whichfol-
lowed on the temperature (not temperament) of the
sexes, and the size and weight of the brain in 696 in-
sane persona. Rather dangerous ground this for
delicate sympathies ! Of such are the partisans
of the negro against Dr. Oibb and his
new discovered "bodies" in the larynx
of the black races, which are only rudimentary in the
white. How these charming students can satisfy
themeelvesthat they, witb all their divination of the
heart, see the way through the most debate-
able problems of science, is to me a mystery. I
came away more than ever convinced of the
truth that " doctors differ," and that though the
most courteous of mankind to their patients, they
are not remarkable ,for tender feeling towards one
another ; they cut one another up, in fact, by turns,
as if each considered his learned brother chirnrgus a
fair rapid mortuutm Perhaps this is the spectacle
the ladies come to see ; they always did enjoy tour-
naments of old, and the bull fights of to-day ;—ia it
not natural they should be interested in these trials
of strength between the intellectual gladiators 1 I
looked round in these zoological and anthropologi-
cal disputations for Professors Owen, Huxley,
and Tyndall, but they were not at Land to bar.
monise the differences or to make the discords
more melodious, and, so far as I can learn, are
I not likely to be present at this meeting.
Then if you go into the Mechanical Section there is
to be seen the same kind of thing, only of course
much less emotional in its aspect. The ladies here
might be seen with many of those delight' ul-looking
vigorous old gentlemen and a very few young
lords in waiting, all evidently as much amused
asl was to see half the engineering talent of Great
Britain brought to bear upon a tiny model locomo-
tive that would not go simply for want of steam.
It was very droll to see how these great men could
not resist giving the thing a push when it stopped,
and bow they laughed and relishedfthe joke as they

one and all came to the admirable conclusion that if
the principle were all right no doubt the ris inertia
might be overcome iu the manner proposed
by Mr. Barlow. In Section F, Economic Scienoe,
Bishop Coleuso spoke upon a very dry subject, and,
of course, without the least opening for a word upon
controversies with which bis name is now assn
ciated ; but the audience had made up their minds
that the opportunity of giving some expression of
opinion, and they cheered him right rigorously. In
appearance the Bishop of Natal is a man you could
not pass. He is tall and decidedly a handsome
man, with a countenance which mostly bears witness
to intellectual sincerity and singleness, a manner
extremely unassuming, restrained and reserved, yet
neither austere nor cold—in a word, an English
gentleman.

The Sections were deserted on Saturday for the
excursions, and a most agreeable safety valve these
are to the high pressure of paper-readings and dis-
cussions. I joined the one which was under Mr.
Moore's conduct to see geological wonders of the pre-
Adamite earth is situ, and to many beauties by the
way. The morning was magnifioent,Nrith scarce a
cloud ; but Bath mornings have a beauty as treaoher•
one as a belle of the Assembly rooms no le retour. We
were acme two hundred and fifty strong, and found
the train ready to bowl away with us down the
Bradford Valley line of the Great Western, through
a lovely vale with eloping banks of parklike
scenery, rick in elms and fat cattle, and
the sleepy Avon at our side all the way.
We passed through or near a place called
Limpley Stoke where the drift named Mammal had
been found, containing remains of the great musk
deer andelephant—Bubalus Moechatna and Elephas
primigenius, according to programme. At West-
bury, by the roadside, were large ironworks, esta-
blished about five years since, where we saw work-
men finding the ore on the surface of the ground—a
de of Oxford oolitic age, aswe are informed ;
and
;Id
ging from the heaps of "slag'' cast away
from he furnaces, the yield must bee satisfactory
one. Landed at Frome, a vast caravan was formed
in vehicles of every shape—gentlemen's carriages,
furniture vans, omnibuses, flies, dogcarts, and some
of unknown species that looked like Eastern arabaa.
After a check the leading 'party bad to hark back
to • place by the roadside, where was seen Mr. Moore
forming the apex of a great hillock, the sides of
which were covered with philosophers as thick as
bees, and all around on the aides of the bank, beyond
the deep break at the foot of this hillock, were
groups of geologists and ,quasi-geologists., Mr.
Moore having established himself on this throne,
begaisbyclaimingan allegiance to the Autocrat fora
day ; and as one of his subjects I must say his rule
was most agreeable all through, and most instruc-
tive, notwithstanding that as he whistled us after
him for miles up hill and dale, 1 felt myself
irresistibly transmogrified into one of a large
peek of very intelligent hounds. Mr. Moore
gave us capital little pithy lectures, driving his
shaft* into Professor Phillips and Mr. Saunders,
and K Hebbert, of the Institut, who ran well up
with the hounds everywhere, though he must bare
carried weight iu his wallet with a big steel chisel
anda hammer, as I know, for he struck a tremen-
dous Mow at a rock just under my nose. French-
man-like, however, he was polite enough to say,
"Prenez garde, Monsieur," as he suited the action
to the word, and I escaped without injury. Well,
I was going to say, that the point of all that Mr.
Moore, who is a self-taught geologist, had
to say, and especially to call the attention
of Professor Phillips to, was that here were
to be seen massive rocks of carboniferous limestone
as young as the lower liaa, and that the ores of lead,
iron, and calamine (oxide of zinc) are of much later
date than the carboniferous limestone. The younger
geologist seemed to take especial delight in upset-
ting old theories, and putting them much into the
condition of the mixed masses of rock he showed
and described. Mr. Moore has found about a
million or more specimens of rare Mammals. reptiles,
and fishes in the oolitic deposits found hereabouts
upon the limestone and between the limestone. He
be had no sooner taken his stand upon the spot by
the roadside where he found all these than he
stooped and picked out a small tooth and held
it up to view. He had carted away three loads of
this debris to his cellar, and then worked upon it
night and day for two years, with the splendid re-
ward I hare mentioned, to the immense en-
richment of the Bath Museum and the advance of
the science, or at least of the materials, of Palaeon-
tology. It was impossible to resist the propensity
to discovery, and myself and one or two
others were fortunate in finding teeth of the Acrotus
and the Myoeerbis, a small species of r---..iTeW—ioct
in these regions,!where once the ancient sea of
Somerset joined the Malvern Straits of Professor
Murchison, but a marsupiate animal which Mr.
Moore told us is now living in Australia.
On the way to see the Roman pavement, discovered
about twenty-five years ago at Whatley, we entered
the fine old ruined castle of if unney—a place obsti-
nately held by the Cavaliers, but battered in at last
by some of old Noll's Cllllloll. Oar party was now'
whistled away across beautiful undulating meadows
and along a charming greenilaue, w here tho grou ;is of
ladies and gentlemen came in witb;splendicUartuitic
effect, and all the better from the dresses having'
had the starch taken out of them by the fine grow-
ing showers. Presently we approached what
seemed a low barn or pigstye, where
was a little knot of country people,
and by the rough entrance stood a man
in a smock-frock with a tray of Roman relics,
a bronze fibula, coins of Constantine, a very small
bronze figure of a dog, bits of old glass, a piece of red
pottery stamped with the maker's name, and many
iron nails. At last I came within a few ranks of
the low entrance, the dark place seemed to be
swallowing up the whole party, not a creature came
back, and I began to murmur to myself Dante's
inscription on a certain place, "Lasciate ogni ape-
ranee," dm., when it was my turn to descend. Ire
this mysterious place was Mr. Thomas Wright,
whose specialitd is excavation and explanation,
holding forth, in words inaudible however, upon
this being the floor of a Roman villa, The pavement
is of the usual small tesserte with little red and black
in ornament, and figures of elephant, lion, &c., in
places injured, but, on the whole, tolerably per-
fect. A bead of Ceres, with cornucopia, and two
fish, is the beat part A drawing was shown to aid
in understanding it, which might be very much
better than it is.

The pretty scenery of the Value, a word probably
corrupted from the old Norman " Fslaise," is well
worth seeing, it is quite of the picturesque
order, and with the brook in the bottom
reminds one of the "Combos" of Devonshire
At the top of the high wooded beak, sew