Dr. Siemens, on 'Wednesday, gave a lecture at the Society
of Arts, John Street, Adelphi, on the comparative cost of lighting by gas and electricity. He held that electricity was the cheaper, the annual cost of an incandescent lamp being 20s. 10d., against 29s. for a gas-burner of equal illuminating power. The first cost, however, of establishing machinery to light a parish would
be 2177,000 for electricity, against 280,000 for gas; and this ques- tion of original capital would form the great obstacle to the supersession of gas. It would take e14,000,000 to provide the plant for the electric illumination of London, and £64,000,000 to furnish it for all England ; while the delay in making the necessary machinery and conductors on so vast a scale would be very great. Electricity would be the light of luxury, but not of general use. Gas, doubled in luminosity by new methods of manufacture and new fittings, would supply the latter. Dr. Siemens is probably the first authority on this subject, but it must be remembered that his calculations necessarily apply only to existing modes of generating electricity.
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