the heated condition of the gun-cotton which ignited, added to its being at the time in a state of chemical activity, determined its explosion, and the explosion of the other packages was a necessary consequence of the violent concussion to which they were exposed. There can be no doubt that the results of the recent experiments and of those made last year, as also the results of the Stowmarket accident, have to be considered in relation to the quantities of gun-cotton operated upon, as well as to its confinement. The confinement of the eight strong packages by the layers of boxes which surrounded them on all sides in the Woolwich experiment, was probably quite as great as that afforded by the light and roomy shed in which the twenty-four boxes of the same kind were placed in double layers, in the South Coast experiments; yet in the latter case an explosion was developed, and not in the former with the smaller quantity. In the South Coast experiments, with 6 cwt. of gun-cotton, the explosions occurred eight seconds and ten seconds after the ignition of the gun-cotton; in the Stowmarket magazine, where several tons of gun-cotton were stored, the explosion appears to have almost immediately followed ignition; it must be borne in mind, however, that in this case much of the gun-cotton was very closely confined by the large number of surrounding packages, and that the temperature of the gun-cotton was already raised considerably throughout by long-continued very hot weather. Both of these circumstances must have greatly favoured the very rapid development of explosion, independently of the much more intense heat generated by the rapid spreading of fire through a large proportion of the gun-cotton. The satisfactory results obtained in the South Coast experiments with the lightly-constructed boxes, with employment of 6 cwt. of material, appear to have received confirmation from the result of an accident which occurred in 1869 at Penryn, when a magazine of brickwork containing 20 cwt. of compressed gun-cotton, packed in boxes of light structure, was burned down without any explosion. But it is nevertheless very possible that a similar result would not be furnished by several tons of gun-cotton similarly packed; the much higher temperature which would be developed in that case by the first spreading of the fire, and the additional confinement, due to the larger number of packages, might combine to develop conditions favourable to the violent explosion of some portion of the mass, though no doubt a much larger proportion would burn non-explosively than if strong boxes were used. While, therefore, in storing dry gun-cotton, the probability of violent explosions resulting from the accidental ignition of a magazine may be considerably diminished, or at any rate the violence of a possible explosion much reduced, by storing the material in packages of which some portions will yield readily to pressure from within, or by adopting any other storagearrangement whereby the rapid penetration of flame or heat between the compressed masses is promoted, it must be considered as conclusively established by the last twelve months' experience that such regulations as experience and prudence have rendered essential in connection with the storage of gunpowder and other explosive agents, must also apply to the storage of compressed gun-cotton when in the dry state. The rapid development which has taken place within the last few years in the industrial applications of powerful explosive agents bids fair to continue. In illustration of this a brief reference may be made to some recent interesting results arrived at by Dr. Sprengel, who has observed that mixtures of liquid oxidizing agents (such as nitric acid) with liquid or solid oxidizable substances, may be made to detonate, as also mixtures of readily oxidizable liquids with solid oxidizing agents. Thus, mixtures of picric acid or of nitrobenzol with nitric acid, or of chlorate of potash with bisulphide of carbon, may be readily detonated, and are more or less violently destructive in their action. Important advantages, in point of power in the one instance and of economy in the other, appear to be promised by the production, in compressed masses, of mixtures of gun-cotton pulp with considerable proportions of chlorate of potash or saltpetre. Even the efficiency of gunpowder itself as a mining agent has been decidedly augmented in some directions by the lecturer's observation that it is susceptible of violent explosion by detonation, like all other explosive preparations, and that strong confinement is consequently not essential to the development of its full explosive force. This observation has proved to be especially valuable in connection with submarine operations, for which the charges of gunpowder need no longer, as formerly, be confined in cases of great strength. There are several other directions in which the study of the behaviour of explosive agents, under conditions compatible with their practical application, promises to be fruitful of important results. [F. A. A.] WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, Friday, May 24, 1872. SIR HENRY HOLLAND, Bart. M.D. D.C.L. F.R.S. President, PROFESSOR W. K. CLIFFORD, M.A. On Babbage's Calculating Machines. [No Abstract received.] WEEKLY EVENING MEETING, Friday, May 31, 1872. SIR FREDERICK POLLOCK, Bart. M.A. Manager, in the Chair. On Old Art and New Art. WE are all familiar with the argument which, while it admits that the great artists of history, whether Greek or Italian, may have conceived and realized an ideal of the human form which in these days we cannot pretend to rival, yet insists that ideas on this subject are, to use a modern vulgarism, "played out"-that we want our art to be more in accordance with the spirit of the age, which is an age of realities and progress, that our art must be above all realistic, and show us nature as we see her around us, and that it must also progress and keep pace with the advancement of science and education so as to give us something new. I do not say that the argument put in this broad and coarse form exactly expresses the opinion of any really thoughtful persons, but it is at the root of much that is written and said on the subject, and that by persons who have the command of a great deal of art-education in this country, and who at all events imagine that they have well considered the subject; and it is plausible enough to require refutation, for it is apparently not obvious to everyone at first sight where the great distinction lies between science and art which should restrain the latter within certain impassable boundaries, while there is apparently no limit possible to the discoveries and novelties of which the former is capable; and persons who hold these views do not see how essential it is to the very existence of an art that it should have an ideal of beauty-that, as it can only appeal to our minds or hearts through our senses, unless it does so on some principle of choice or selection, we gain no more from it than we gain from the observation of nature itself that the human form and face, containing as they do the highest qualities of beauty which nature presents for our admiration, the study of them with a view to rendering the most complete abstract expression of their beauty and vitality, is the highest to which an artist can devote himself that the aspects not only of human but of all natural beauties, being the same in all ages, there is no new discovery to be made in the matter; and so, not seeing, or caring to see, this, they cannot judge how near perfection in the attainment of this ideal the art of the past arrived, or how nearly it reached the limits outside of which it is incapable of further development, and, not feeling competent to discuss this point, willingly concede to Greek art the achievement of a perfection for which they know the crown has always been awarded to it. What they desire, in fact, is an art which shall appeal more directly to minds incapable of appreciating its more elevated characteristics; and this, they persuade themselves, would be a higher development, because appealing to a wider range-of what?-not of sympathies, as they imagine, but in truth, of minds incapable of wide sympathies. Moreover, the argument that the progress of knowledge has given us new and more varied themes for expression, and therefore tends to produce a further development of art, must fall to the ground, unless it can be shown that these themes are of a kind that lend themselves specially to artistic treatment. The truth is, that any attempt to rival or surpass the chefs-d'œuvre of the past must be made on the same conditions and in the same spirit that animated the producers of those great works. Were science to discover for us the cause of every natural phenomenon that exists, nay, were it to reach the final cause of life itself, the glow of the evening sky would be none the more or less beautiful, nor the grace of a child's movements one whit diminished or increased. These, indeed, are eternal beauties and unchangeable, and they are what the artist has to treat of; and though he may never be able to arrive at the complete expression of them, he can see to the end of them, for they live for ever for his continued contemplation. I have no hesitation in saying that art has lost more than it has gained by our modern modes of thought and feeling, and that if it be asked why we cannot put away the traditions of the past, and work in the modern spirit, the answer is that the modern spirit is becoming daily more opposed to the artistic spirit, and is precisely what hampers its expression; that what is good in the art of to-day, is good in the same way, and for the same reasons, as the old is good; that we have no lights on the subject which were not also clear to the old masters, and that where we seem to have struck out a new path, we have only chosen one which they purposely and rightly rejected ; where we seem to have discovered a new truth, it proves to be one beside the question. Now there are, I think, two causes to be found for the immense difference in the aim and results of our modern work as compared with that of the ancients. I should have said rather that there are two ways in which the modern spirit is opposed to the artistic spirit; and one of these is in a noble direction, and is due to the spread of a philosophy-I might almost call it a religion-which insists on the recognition of certain qualities, moral and Divine, inherent in ideas or impressions of beauty, which recognition is necessary on the part of the artist to the production of a high form of art. The second, or ignoble way, may be broadly stated as due to the fact, that artists, from motives of indolence or interest, have allowed themselves to be led by the opinion of the public, instead of being, as of old, indifferent to it, and themselves leading the way to a better appreciation on the part of the public, of the capabilities of art. Now both these causes have curiously enough led to the same result; I mean they have both been instrumental in leading to a prevalent belief that the imitation of nature, or perhaps I should say the record of his impressions of nature, is the aim and purpose of the artist. It will be necessary, then, before going further, that we should inquire in what way and how far a mere imitation of nature may result in a work of art. And, in speaking of imitation, I must be understood to use the word in the sense of copying.. Fuseli defines the difference between copying and imitation in this way: "Precision of eye and obedience of hand are the requisites of the former, without the least pretence to choice, what to select, what to reject; whilst choice, directed by judgment or taste, constitutes the essence of imitation, and alone can raise the most dexterous copyist to the noble rank of an artist." But it seems to me that it is impossible for an artist not to choose what he is going to paint; he may choose stupidly, but a choice of some kind he must make, so with this difference I take his definition of copying as what I mean by imitation. When I say that the belief of which I am speaking is a very prevalent one, I judge not so much by what is said and written on the matter as by the large quantity of merely imitative work which is to be met with in our numerous art-exhibitions, and the amount of success such work meets with. Now it is quite true that an imitation of nature may be a work of art; when at its best it calls forth all the highest technical qualities of the painter, the qualities that distinguish him as a painter from the poet who describes nature in another way. This precision of eye and obedience of hand requisite for the rendering of colour and form, include the whole art of painting, and are found in perfection only in the work of the most highly-gifted artists; but they are distinctly only the painter's qualities and exclude the mental. Moreover, being the qualities which are necessary to his existence as a painter, and without which he is nothing, they take the lowest place among the artistic faculties. But the fact remains, that a mere imitation of nature-what is called realistic painting, though I should be inclined to call it materialistic-(I have already endeavoured to explain in a lecture on Beauty and Idealism" how a true realism is one of the highest forms of art)-the fact remains that this imitative painting may be so admirably done as to become of a high order of merit. It is the essence of portrait-painting, though for a good portrait other qualities are doubtless required. It is the essence also of landscape-painting, though for good landscapes other qualities are required; and it is all that is necessary for still-life painting. But it is only the groundwork of ideal art, and is akin to the language by which the poet expresses his thoughts. It is, in fact, the language of art, and may be used by the artist for the three purposes following: it may be used to describe the ordinary aspects of nature, and through the knowledge of these aspects |