Repository: UIHistories Project: Sophograph - 1890 [PAGE 24]

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T H E.

OGRAPH.

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When finally the immortal Fulton applied am to propel vessels through the water.—when E " ran his firsi locomotive engine from Liverpool to Maneli er.—when Morse applied electricity to the telegraph, then the revolution in our mode of life seemed almost complete and man * .» power over the forces of nature and its elements, instantly working against him, appeared well nigh absolute. Surely the engineer is entitled to the lion hare of the credit due in bringing about the unparalled prosperity of the r country. From his brain orginated all the d ^ ns for the < large and substantial bridges that carry our highway* I APID as has been the growth of the art of the en- railroads over the largest rivers, and thereby overcome the gineer, daring the last century, we must, if we would barriers nature had put there. The engineer supervised and trace its origin, seek among the earliest evidences of civiliza- directed the host of laborers, craftsmen and mechanics thai tion. \\ h.en settled communities were few and isolated, op- constructed and equipped the many thousand miles of railportunities for the exchange of knowledge were insufficient road that made the rapid development of thi mntrv posor wanting. It has been shown what the true position of sible. Millions of people daily trust their lives ami fortun engineering is in the universal activity towards the solution to the care ami skill of the engineer, to his ability and to his of the great problem of culture, and the methods have been integrity—on the decks of steam-hoats. cr< ing lakes, and pointed out. which it has ever pursued since the earliest ascending and descending rivers ; on railroad train-. cr< % times. continents with uninterrupted rapidity : in our palace h -\s Of all the great engineers of ancient times, Archimedes and in public halls, and in the very privacy of our houses, the was the greatest ; at least he is one of the few men of the whole community, is constantly at the mercy of theengini . profession of whom we known anything definite, lie is, and any neglect on his part would at once be the cause of abovi ill others, the one man who laid the foundation of far-reaching annoyance and inconvenience or even of gl t mtific research, the prosecution and improvemeni of which calamity. an- the boa of the present day. In viewing some of the achievments of engineering Daring the hark Ages, from the downfall of the Etonian cience, the one work which strikes the imagination n r I. pii > the beginning of the 17th century, the civil en- forciblv, chiefly on account of its ex linu magnitude, is gineer D hardly be said to have existed ; and he was the great Pacific Railways, which. passim: through \ known in England and Prance until the beginning regions hitherto inaccessible to civilised man. and over n> f tl, iry. midable mountain chains, joins California with the Atlanti When thai time England furnished a Newton, and States. v Gern a J itz, the mind of the practical engineerwai Sun s of this great project were inaugurated in l L, md ly to utilize their knowledge. the prosecution of which was not entireh void difficnl*

PROGRESS OF ENG NEERING.

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