More Books of the Week
(Continued from page 435.)
Scientific research is perhaps a little less undervalued to-day in England than it used to be, but • there• are still many so-called practical men who begrudge the expense of it. To these, and to wiser people, we commend the very remarkable set of memoirs of great scientists • which Mr. Rollo Appleyard has written under the title of Pioneers of Electrical Communication (Macmillan, 21s.). He deals with the lives and achievements of ten great men to whose patient scientific investigations we owe virtually the whole Of modern electrical industry . and especially the telegraph, telephone and wireless. Volta, Ampere and Chappe,' Ohm, Hertz and Oersted, Wheatstone, Ronalds, Clerk Maxwell anti; Heaviside are all names of the first importance in the history of electricity, and Mr. Appleyard's precise accounts of what these men did or tried to do are of high intere:st and value. The chapter on Oliver Heaviside, who died only five years ago at an advanced age after devoting the whole of his life to abstruse studies in mathematical -physics, is- specially notable. Heaviside -was indeed a pioneer, for the full value of his work is only _now beginning to be realized by wireless experts. Mr. Appleyard; does: not fail to :quote the fanious reply from the Admirality in 1816 to Itonalds' offer of a primi- tive electric telegraph— 'telegraphs a any kind are now wholly unnecessary and no other than the one in use will be adopted," the, telegraph in question being_a eltunsy sema- phore. If the bureaucrats had had their way, the electric telegraph would still be a dream of the future. ,
Previous page
