The Locomotive - Lighthouse Survival Blog

1901.] THE LOCOMOTIVE. 189
struction. Any reform in the present system of secondary education is met by a cry
that what is needed is culture. The latter quality is difficult to define: but if we may
take Emerson, as a guide, it consists in an ability to write and talk gracefully and intel.
ligently on a wide range of subjects.
Up till recent years, the practical applications of science were so few that there
was, perhaps, little necessity that a man of culture should have an understanding of
engineering matters; but, at present, mechanism enters into every department of our
daily life, and no one can avoid having to touch upon it in conversation or in writing.
It is here that the old system shows its weak points. The leader-writers of our great
daily papers are largely recruited from Oxford, which, though singularly destitute of
great names in either literature or science, furnishes the bulk of the second-class lite-
rary men who edit the daily papers and monthly reviews. These write on all subjects,
and generally well; but when their evil stars compel them to discourse on scientific or
technical matters, their ignorance of the most common elementary facts is little less
than astounding. In the nature of things, these gentlemen unfortunately have a great
influence over public opinion, and it is doubtless largely due to them that we see the
present waste of funds in the establishment and support of second-rate polytechnics,
while the higher-class institutions are most inadequately endowed. It is possible, how-
ever, that this state of affairs is a necessary preliminary to teaching the public the su-
preme importance of work of higher quality. The man who has some elementary
knowledge of scientific matters will spot the absurdities that now too frequently fall
from the pens of the average leader-writers, and a demand will ultimately arise for
gentlemen of a wider culture, and less restricted education, to direct the energies of the
Press. Till this time arrives, we fear that our leading technical schools must continue
to compare badly, both in equipment and in the dimensions of their teaching staffs, with
similar establishments abroad.— Engineering (London).
Concerning" Wireless Telegraphy.
We have been frequently asked to express our views on the subject of wireless tele-
graphy, but have refrained from doing so up to the present time, lest we might do injus-
tice, inadvertently, to the several experimeuters who are investigating the possibilities
of the art. These possibilities are now fairly plain, and we commend to our readers the
following article, from the Electrical Review of November 30th, which expresses the view
that we take of the matter, as clearly as we could hope to express it ourselves :
" For some time past the advertising columns of the daily papers in this country
have been largely patronized by various wireless telegraph companies offering stock in
their enterprises for sale. It is noticeable that none of these companies is offering to
sell instruments, or to transmit messages. Doubtless, numerous certificates of stock
have been sold, and, doubtless, these are engraved with ink as green, and with engine
turning as elaborate, as ever decorated a railroad bond. The American public is today
very much the same as it was when the late illustrious P. T. Barnum made his discovery
that it liked to be fooled. Companies for the creation of power from liquid air have
bloomed and withered ; the exploitation of the stock of a concern for extracting gold
from sea-water was attended with no little success. Doubtless, if somebody incorporated
a concern for extracting sunshine from cucumbers, the stock would find a ready sale,
but it would properly belong to the province of the technical press to warn investors
that such securities are founded, to say the least, on a somewhac dubious basis. Concerning
the wireless telegraph companies, it may truly be said that there is no doubt