The Sun.
London, England, 1864-09-15 00:00:00

BRITISH ASSOCIATION,

BATH, Wednesday.

The British Association for the Advancement of
Science opened its learned congress in this locality
of hot springs and dyspeptic invalids to-day. The
fixture was well made, for, independent of the
beauty of the city itself, is not Bath within less
than half an hour's ride of the busy port of Bristol
And although the proceedings of the savans of the
British Association are chiefly confined to indoor
disquisitions, the ard ttologically disposed will find
in Old Sarum, Stonehenge, and many ancient re-
mains in the neighbourhood, abundant materials for
investigation and research. And whether from this
or the other attractions held cut to visitors—
whether the expected presence of Bishop Colenso,
the address of Dr. Livingstone on his African dis.
coveries, or the hospitalities offered by the local
authorities—certain it is that the gathering pro.
mises to be an unusually large one, and among the
distinguished individuals who have either already
arrived or have signified their intention to be pre-
sent are the following:—Earl Nelson, the Earl of
Cork, Earl of Enniskillen, Bishop Colenso, the
Bishop of Bath and Wells, the Bishop of Oxford,
Lady Franklin, Sir Roderick Murchison, Sir W. G.
Armstrong, Sir J. Bowring, Sir W. Jardine, Sir B.
Brodie, Sir E. Belcher, Sir W. Jones, Sir W. Lo-
gan (director of the Geological Survey of Canada),
Sir A. Elton, Sir W. Trevelyan, Sir Alex. Milne,
K.C,8., Major-General Sir A. S. Waugh, Sir R.
H. Schomberg, Hon. A. Vernon Harcourt, the Dean
of Hereford, the Dean of Cork, the Ven, Archdea-
con Brown, the Rev. Canon Moseley, Hon. and
Rev. S. Best, Rev. W. Symonds, F.G.S., Rev. J.
Yates, F.R.S., Mr Tite, M.P,, Mr Bazley, M.P.,
Commander Pym, Major. General Younghnsband,
Lieut..-Col. Hogg, Col. Kennedy, Captain Maury,
C.S.N., Professors Willis, Voelcker, Bazley, Rol-
leston, Roscoe, Rogers (Cambridge, Mass.), Wil-
liamson, Balfour, Babbington, Bell (Canada),
Ansted, Abel (Royal Arsenal, Woolwich), Hark-
ness, T. R. Jones, Daubeny, Liveing, H. J.
Smith, Stevelly, Williamson, Van Benenden
(Ostend), Von Seebach, Phillips ; Drs. Living.
stone, W. Farr, J. E. Gray (British Museum),
Hooker (Kew Gardens), Van Doesberg (Rotterdam),
T. Wright, Gladstone, Britten, Thurnham, Boyd,
Herapath, Scott Russell, WV hitworth (the artillerist),
E. J. Lowe (the astronomer), T. Backland, Lankes-
ter, Etheiridge (Geological Museum), M. Hippius
(Russia), M. Meyer (Berne), &o. Seven sections
will sit daily during the congress, beginning to.
morrow.

Notwithstanding the heavy rain which deluged
the streets of Bath during nearly the whole of the
day, the members continued to pour in up to the
evening, and the railway station was a scene of great
confusion. There was very little to see or hear until
the evening meeting in the theatre. Sections will
sit daily up to Wednesday next, and among the
other arrangements for the week are—To-morrow
evening, a conversazione in the assembly-rooms;
Friday evening, a lecture by Professor Roscoe on
" The Chemical Action of Light ;" Saturday, an ex-
cursion to Frome, Holwell, and the Vallis, and
banquet by the Mayor of Bath ; Monday evening,
Dr Livingstone's address concerning his explora-
tions in Africa during the last six years ; Tuesday,
microscopical soiree in the Assembly Rooms ; Wed-
nesday, concluding general meeting in the Assembly
Rooms, and evening banquet in the Guildhall, given
by Mr Tite, M.P. As supplementary to the week's
doings. there are also two excursions arranged for
Thursday, the 22d, viz., to Bristol and Clifton
(where the Mayor of Bristol entertains the visitors),
and to Salisbury, Old Sarum, and Stonehenge.
Among the objects of interest in Bath itself may
be enumerated the Abbey Church, the Museum of
the Literary and Scientific Institution, Roman
remains and tesselated pavement in situ, a private
geological collection (made by the late Joseph
Channing Pearce, EKI at the residence of
Mr Bush, in the Circus ; a valuable collection of
Saxon coins, the property of Capt. Murchison ; the
Baths and Pump-room, Guildhall, &c.
The Lusiness on the opening day of the congress,
up to the delivery of the inaugural address by the
President in the evening, has been chiefly of a
formal character. Such was the character of the
meeting of the General Committee in the Guildhall
thi3 afternoon, the object of their assembling being
to complete the arrangements for the week already
organised by the working staff. The leading attrac-
tion to-day, as already mentioned, has been the gene-
ral meeting in the theatre this evening. At this
meeting the chair having been formally resigned by
Sir W. Armstrong, it was taken by Sir Charles
Lyell, who proceeded at once to deliver the follow-
ing inaugural address :

Gentlemen of the British Association—The place
where we have been invited this year to hold our
thirty-fourth meeting is one of no ordinary interest
to the cultivators of physical science. What renders
Bath a peculiar point of attraction to the student of
natural plaenomenais its thermal and mineral waters,
to the sanitary powers of which the city has owed
its origin and celebrity. The great volume and high
temperature of these waters render them not only
unique in our island, but perhaps without a parallel
in the rest of Europe, when we duly take into account
their distance from the nearest region of violent
earthquakes or of active or extinct volcanoes. The
spot where they issue, as we learn from the researches
of the historian and antiquary, was lonel3L and desert
when the Romans first landed in this island, but in a
few years it was converted into one of the chief cities
of the newly conquered province. On the site of the
hot springs was a large morass, from which clouds
of white vapour rose into the air; and there first was
the spacious bathroom built in a highly ornamental
style of architecture, and decorated with columns,
pilasters, and tesselated pavements. By its Bide was
erected a splendid chapel, dedicated to Minerva, of
which some statues and altars with their inscriptions
and ornate pillars are still to be seen in the museum
of this place. To these edifices the quarters of the
garrison, end in the course of time, the dwellings of
new settlers were added ; and they were all encircled
by a massive wall, the solid foundations of which
et ill remain. A dense mass of soil and rubbish, from
ten to twenty feet thick, now separates the level on
which the present city stands from the level of the
ancient Aquae Solis of the Romans. Digging through
this mass of heterogeneous materials, coins and
coffins of the S axon period have been found ; and
lower down, beginning at the depth of from 12 to
15 feet from the surface, coins have been disinterred
of Imperial Rome, bearing dates from the reign of
Claudius to that of Maximus in the fifth century.
Beneath the whole are occasionally seen tessellated
pavements still retaining their bright colours, one
of which, on the site of the Mineral Water Hospi-
tal, is still carefully preserved, affording us an op-
portunity of gauging the difference of level of
ancient and modern Bath. On the slopes and sum.
mite of the picturesque hills in the neighbourhood
rose many a Roman villa, to trace the boundaries of
which, and to bring to light the treasures of art
concealed in them are tasks which have of late years
amply rewarded the researches of Mr Scarth and
other learned antiquaries. No wonder that on this
favoured spot we should meet with so many memo-
rials of former greatness, when we reflect on the
length of time during which the imperial troops
and rich colonists of a highly civilised people so-
journed here, having held undisturbed possession
of the country for as many years as have elapsed
from the first discovery of America to our own
times. One of our former presidents, Dr Daubeny,
has remarked that nearly all the most celebrated
hot springs of Europe, such as those of
Aix-la-
Chapelle, Baden_Beden, Naples, Aavergne, and the
Pyrenees, have not declined in temperature since
the days of the Romans; for many of them still re-
tain as great a beat as is tolerable to the human
body, and yet, when employed by the ancients,
they do not seem to have required to be first cooled
down by artificial means. This uniformity of tem.
perature, maintained in some places for more than
2,000 years, together with the cons'
volume of the water, which never
varies with i-12
the
the
seasons, as in ordinary springs—the identity also of
the mineral ingredient which, century after cen-
tury, are held by each spring in solution—are
striking facts, and they tempt us irresistibly to
speculate on the deep subterranean sources both
of the heat and mineral matter. How long has
this uniformity prevailed ? Are the ppringe really