The Sun.
London, England, 1841-11-11 00:00:00

LECTURE on CIVIL ENGINEERING
Professor Vignole's Introductory Lecture on Civil
Engineering, delivered yesterday afternoon in the
theatre of the London University College, was attended
by a scientific audience; consisting in a great degree of
the students of the College. The Professor observed
that the series of lectures were chiefly intended for a
distinct class who were forming themselves in the Col-
lege for practical and skilful engineers. The opportu-
nities that presented themselves to the followers of this
science, were numerous and important in the forma-
tion of railroads over the country, the opening of roads,
the extension of canals, the improvement of har-
bours, and the construction of waterworks, all
of which present to the engineer capabilities
for arriving at perfection in his art, more espe-
cially when, as a practical man, he combined them
with scientific principles. It was matter of much regret
that many works in England had been executed by in-
competent parties ; which manifestly showed a want of
that combination of skill and practical sense which alone
form an excellent engineer. It had been objected that
a college education was not the best fitted to con-
stitute the engineer. This the Professor con-
ceded. But, according to the college rules in rogue,
the student was compelled to be a workman at first,
and so become a business man preliminarily, while scien-
tific acumen and study were sequent. Some doubt existed
as to the precise difinition of civil engineering. The
writers of the middle ages used it in the enlarged sense
of a military term, and such acceptation continued
the commencement of the last century. Its signification
in this sense was broad, and chiefly mechani-
cal. It applied itself to hydraulic, naval, and military
architecture, and it would be curious to trace historically,
how long architecture and engineering were practised
by the same individual, being sciences which modern
practice has so widely dissociated. The distinction now
rests in this : architecture deals in the decorative and
beautiful ; engineering in plans marked by their magni-
tude, extent, and utility. The student should, above
all things, strike out his separate and distinct path.
Natural philosophy, chemistry, mathematics, and geo-
logy, were among the principia of the engi-
neer's education ; together with the drawing of
lines and figures on geometric principles, the whole
being ruled by neatness, skill, and I recision.
The periodical literature of the day abounded with ex-
cellent information and scientific criticism. Without in-
vidious preference, the Mechanics' Magazine and the
Civil Engineer's and Architect's Journal, were eminently
instructive. Of the institutions in London, absolutely
necessary to the student, were the model-room of the
Civil Engineers, the Museum of the United Service,
and the Museum of the Geological Society. The
works for the aid of the scholar, extant in this coun-
try, and still more those on the Continent, were
numerous, and of high character, the reports of Smeaton,
Telford, Rennie, Tredzold, the Royal Engineer's reports,
the Annales de Chimie, and, above all, Delafontaine's
book upon the works on the Rhine, abound in rich ma-
terial. The advantage of students in the College,
guided by the first scientific masters of the day, put
them in train upon the newest discoveries, and
prevented their working upon things which had
been long discovered. The combinations of great
practical skill, with the most refined and consum-
mate science, were manifest in several magnificent in-
ventions of the day. The Earl of Ross, Lord Oxentown,
treading in the steps of Herschel, had produced a re-
flecting telescope, at the contemplation of whose powers
the mind was loft Charles Y. Williams, Esq., of the
London and Liverpool Steam Navigation Com-
pany, had discovered the means of preventing the
generation of smoke, one of the vastest nuisances of our
engines and manufacturing towns. Instruments of the
greatest nicety and make were now available to the
student, to aid him in his geometrical surveys and
geodetic operations ; Captain Drummond's light, which j
bears his name, whose delicate nicety was marvellous,
was capable of being managed by a common soldier ; j
the theodolite could measure distances upon earth, '
as accurately as the telescope the skies. • The
mercantile world sadly complained of the heavy expen-
ditures of railways. It was an axiom with the Professor
never to regard such undertakings as works of art, nor
to estimate them by the high scale which such conside- -
'ration called for, but to regard them according to the
actual profit resulting from them. Expenditure should
be kept down, and recklessness abated. An en-
gineer of eminence was at issue with him on
this point, and expressed himself thus in conver-
sation, " Never tell people, at first, what the
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Parliament had been decried for enforcing engineers in
their calculations to enter into precise and detailed rela-
tions of their plans ; the Professor considered that the
Standing Orders of Parliament had only ordered what
was just and proper It had been said by some philo-
sopher that the Egyptians had been masters of
much greater mechanical skill and powers of
engineering than the scanty. records of Herodotus and
Thodorus show ; but even in these a penetrating mind
discovers more than he dreamed at firrt, llerodotus
in describing Cyrus proceeding with his works at Mount'
Athos, remarks that the Phunicians made no slopes for
their excavations, which caused them to give way, as
some of the recent slopes Of our railways. An-
other instance of engineering appears in the great bridge
of boats thrown across the Bosphorus, a sample
of military skill precisely similar to that executed by the
left wing of the army, under General Burgoyne, who
threw the bridge of boats over the river Bidassoa, before
their attack on Toulouse. Beacons and harbours were
naturally the first objects of engineering ; the Ita-
lians were the first in the field, and there is in
existence a very ancient print of a dredging machine
invented by the Dutch, exactly similar to the dredging
machine at present in the Thames. France was