CHAPTER XLVI.
The Royal Society and the Royal Institution—Scientific men of the time—Society of Arts—Other learned Societies—Ballooning—Steam—Steamboats—Locomotives—Fourdrinier and the paper-making machine—Coals—Their price—Committee of the House of Commons on coal—Price of coals.
THE ROYAL Institution had just been founded (incorporated 13th January, 1800), and the Gresham lectures were held. The Royal Institution was patronized by its big elder brother, the Royal Society, for in the minutes of the proceedings of the latter, on the 15th of April, 1802, is the following:
“Resolved, that ... the Royal Society be requested to direct their Secretaries to communicate from time to time to the Editor of the Journals of the Royal Institution, such information respecting the Papers read at the Meetings of the Society, as it may be thought proper to allow to be published in these Journals.”
In the first ten years of this century, no great scientific discoveries were made; the most prominent being the researches of that marvellous scientist and Egyptologist, Dr. Thomas Young,[69] in connection with physical optics, which led to his theory of undulatory light.[70] Yet there were good men coming forward, the pioneers of this present age, to whose labours we are much indebted; and any decade might be proud of such names as Faraday, Banks, Rennie, Dr. Wollaston, Count Rumford, Humphrey Davy, and Henry Cavendish, whose discovery of the gaseous composition of water laid the foundation of the modern school of chemistry.
The Society of Arts, too, was doing good work, and the Society of Antiquaries, and the Linnæan Society, were also in existence; but the Horticultural, and Geological Societies, alone, were born during this ten years.
Ballooning was in the same position as now, i.e., bags of gas could, as is only natural, rise in the air, and be carried whither the wind listed; and, especially in the year 1802, ærostatics formed one of the chief topics of conversation, as Garnerin and Barrett were causing excitement by their ærial flights.
Man had enslaved steam, but had hardly begun to utilize it, and knew but very little of the capabilities of its energetic servant. Then it was but a poor hard-working drudge, who could but turn a wheel, or pump water. Certainly a steamboat had been tried on the Thames, and Fulton’s steamboat Clermont was tried on the Seine in 1803, at New York in 1806, and ran on the Hudson in 1807; but the locomotive was being hatched. The use of iron rails to ease the draft was well known, and several patents were granted for different patterns of rail, but they were mainly used in mines, to save horse power. Under the date of 24th March, 1802, is a “Specification of the Patents granted to Richard Trevithick and Andrew Vivian, of the Parish of Camborne, in the County of Cornwall. Engineers and Miners, for Methods for improving the construction of Steam Engines, and the Application thereof for driving Carriages, and for other purposes.” Here, then, we have the germ of the locomotive, which has been one of the most powerful agents of civilization the world ever saw. But it was not till 1811 that the locomotive was used, and then only on a railway connected with a colliery.