ing scientific inquiry with
opportunities for full-scale experiment. A scheme was drafted; it was
discussed and approved at a conference held in the room of the First
Lord of the Admiralty, and was submitted to the Prime Minister, Mr.
Asquith, who took action on it, and appointed 'The Advisory Committee
for 'Aeronautics', under the presidency of Lord Rayleigh. Seven of its
ten members were Fellows of the Royal Society. The chairman was Dr.
Glazebrook. The Army was represented by Major-General Sir Charles
Hadden, the Navy by Captain R. H. S. Bacon, the Meteorological Office by
Dr. W. N. Shaw. The other members were Mr. Horace Darwin, Sir George
Greenhill, Mr. F. W. Lanchester, Mr. H. R. A. Mallock, and Professor J.
E. Petavel. To these, soon after, were added Mr. Mervyn O'Gorman, when
he took over the charge of the balloon factory, and Captain Murray F.
Sueter, R.N., who deserves not a little credit for his early and
persistent efforts to foster aeronautics in the navy. The great value of
this committee was that it brought together the various bodies concerned
with aeronautics, and combined their efforts. In particular, it gave to
the new science the highly skilled services of the National Physical
Laboratory, which organized at Teddington a new department, with
elaborate plant, for the investigation of aeronautical questions. From
this time onward the National Physical Laboratory worked in the closest
co-operation with the balloon factory. Mathematical and physical
investigations were continuously carried on at the laboratory, and
improvements suggested by these researches were put to the practical
test at the factory. Questions of air resistance, of the stresses and
strains on materials, of the best shape for the wing of an aeroplane and
the best fabric for the envelope of an airship--these and scores of
other problems were systematically and patiently attacked. There were no
theatrically quick results, but the work done laid a firm and broad base
for all subsequent success. Hasty popular criticism is apt to measure
the value of scientific advice by the tale of things done, and to
overlook the credit that belongs to it for things prevented. The science
of aeronautics in the year 1909 was in a very difficult and uncertain
stage of its early development; any mistakes in laying the foundations
of a national air force would not only have involved the nation in much
useless expense, but would have imperilled the whole structu