a year can be earned, it will probably occur to most people that a single instance such as that given proves absolutely nothing. The only way of arriving at a just estimate of the relative merits of the three methods would be to trace the careers of as large a number as possible of men who have passed through them.

I am able to give some figures in the case of one method which I think may prove useful. These are in connection with the electrical engineering college which formerly carried on its work in Red Lion-square.

The course given extended over two years-the first year was spent in the college, where theory was taught by means of lectures and experimental work in the various laboratories, while the second year was entirely devoted to actual engineering work with the company to which the college was attached. The life of the college was a short one; it ceased with that of the company, which, like so many others, fell a victim to the Act of 1882. It trained, however, a sufficient number of men to show the results to be expected from the course adopted. Of those whose names appeared on the books, 29 per cent. have been lost sight of, but of the remainder, no less than 72 per cent. are still in the profession, some doing well on their own account, others holding responsible posts. I do not, of course, know what incomes these gentlemen enjoy, but most, if not all, certainly get a good deal more than £100 a year.

With much that Mr. Hall says I thoroughly agree, and if space permitted, I could give curious particulars as to the qualifications of a vast number of so-called electricians. Returning, however, to the unfortunate wrangler, Mr. Hall has, as so many people do, simply considered the training and entirely overlooked the characteristics of the man himself.

A fifth wrangler must either be a mathematician of no mean order, or he must possess extraordinary powers of cramming for examinations. At Cambridge the education of such a man, owing to the rich endowments, need not cost him anything; he may, on the contrary, make his education a source of profit. A man like this, who will not, or cannot, look after his own monetary interests, is not likely to be of any service, from a commercial point of view, to the firm which employs him, and the £100 a year must probably be regarded as a charitable gift to a person who has mistaken his calling, rather than as a salary for useful services rendered.-Yours, etc.,

London, W.C., Oct. 12, 1891.

HUGH ERAT HARRISON.

THE REMUNERATION OF YOUNG ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS.

SIR, Mr. Cuthbert Hall's complaint is an echo of the complaints one has heard from young men just starting in every profession, as far back as one can remember.

The young parson, after quite as expensive an education, and with often quite as good abilities, finds himself, at the age of 23 or so, privileged to wear the glossiest of black coats and the whitest of ties on the magnificent income of perhaps £80 per annum, and with the additional calls upon his purse entailed by visiting the poor.

The young schoolmaster is the same, the young naval and the young military officer also. Nor have the juniors of any of these professions any extraordinary incomes to look forward to in the immediate future. The curate perhaps serves a vicar who administers to the spiritual wants of a large parish and to the temporal wants of a large family on the magnificent income of, say, £250 per annum, with perhaps an Easter gift and a few presents thrown in, and without the smallest prospect of ever being anything else but vicar of the same parish on precisely the same income. The schoolmaster sees men who have been schoolmasters for a score of years getting incomes of £150 or £200. The naval officer sees many of his brother officers that are old enough to be his father getting incomes of from £200 to £300, and that only on condition that they keep two homes, spend several consecutive years away from their families, and exist during the time they are at home on about one-third of the amount.

There are prizes, of course, in all these professions-arch

bishoprics, headmasterships, admirals of the fleet, and so on--but everyone cannot have them.

At present there are few such large prizes in electrical engineering, because it is a new branch, but there are still plenty for those who can get them. As a matter of fact, however, it may be taken that £300 a year is a good average income in these times for a highlyeducated man in almost any of the professions, and that any youngster, no matter what his parents may have spent on his education, must be content to begin at something very small-usually less than the figure Mr. Hall's friend receives and work his way up gradually, as opportunity offers. In electrical engineering there will be plenty of good prizes for men of skill and perseverance as time goes on. But it may be asked, is it any use to educate a lad? Why not let him go as apprentice at 13 or 14 years, and work on that way. The answer is, the education given to a lad in his youth, provided he makes a proper use of it in after years, determines the position he will be able to take, should the opportunity offer, as a man. In these days, under no conceivable circumstances can an uneducated man attain to a leading position in any branch of engineering. The case is very much like many that are met with in manufacturing. A particular kind of clay, for instance, that is used for high-class pottery may be used for inferior work, or a particular piece may be spoilt in the course of manufacture, but under no circumstances could an inferior clay have been made into the higher-class work.

So, too, a particular ingot of steel may be rolled into rails worth a few pounds per ton, or it may be drawn out into watch springs worth over £1,000, but inferior steel could not be made into the latter.

This, then, is the sole end of the education a youth receives-viz., to fit him, or, rather, to enable him to fit himself, for the higher positions he may occupy later in life if circumstances are favourable. This being so, however, is it not wiser to limit the amount spent on education to the probabilities of the future position that the youth may hope to attain. If a working-man could afford the expense, it would surely be unwise for him to send his son to Cambridge, or even to keep him at school during the years that might be more profitably employed in learning his trade.

And this brings one to the question: Is it wise, under ordinary circumstances-such, for instance, as those detailed by Mr. Hall-to incur the expense, and to spend the time necessary to take a degree at Cambridge?

The answer to this must be dictated by the particular conditions of each case. If a young fellow's parents or friends can launch him at a higher level than others have to take; or can look forward to giving him the necessary opportunities that will enable him to reach the highly-paid places without the struggles that others have to make; or if there be particular conditions which render it probable that he will be able to place himself on this higher plane, then the money and time will be well spent. But in the vast majority of cases, parents will not only not be conferring a benefit on their sons by giving them a Cambridge education, they will be doing them a positive injury.

The three years spent at college, however well employed, will not do them one-tenth part of the good for their future work that the same time properly employed in practical work would have done. Living, as articled pupils in electrical engineering works do, in an atmosphere of electricity, they will have very little trouble in acquiring a sound knowledge of theory by reading up in their evenings, if they will. And their knowledge is all the sounder for being constantly subject to the check of practical experience. After a man has left college, too, he is usually too old to teach in the same way as he could have been taught at 17 or 18. Often he thinks he knows more than those placed over him, often he has much to unlearn. His college life also, continued as it is right up to early manhood, tends to unfit him for the rough work in which the best experience is obtained. And when he emerges from his articles at twenty-three or twenty-four years of age, for the greatest part of the work that he may be called upon to do, he is of no greater value than the young man who was articled at 18, although he may be a Cambridge wrangler. His Cambridge education will help him to

calculate to a nicety the resistance of the magnetic circuit of a dynamo, but it will be very little help to him, without practical experience added, when the dynamo perversely refuses to give a current, or a telephone refuses to speak. But it may be asked, is there any advantage to be gained by adopting the profession of an engineer, as against other professions? The answer is, Yes; there are more opportunities to be taken advantage of than in other professions. A curate may preach like an angel, yet, unless he has a relative or friend, or influence, a curate he will remain all his life.

An engineer, however, and particularly an electrical engineer has many ways of making opportunities of showing his knowledge and skill, and of forcing his way to the front by what our American cousins call "sheer grit." That is the great advantage apart, from the fascination of the work, of belonging to some branch of engineering.

Before concluding, it would be as well to point out that very few fortunes, if any, have been made in electrical engineering pure and simple. The fortunes that have been made have been due in nearly every case to lucky strokes of finance, not to engineering, and it is in part due to some of those fortunes that salaries are low, and dividends nonexistent. The business of an electrical engineer is a very expensive one to carry on, principally on account of the very rapid advances that are being made, and the absolute necessity of keeping abreast of them. Also, it is an error, as commercial men well know, to suppose that neither ability nor education are necessary for responsible positions in the commercial world. It will possibly sound like rank heresy to proclaim the fact in an engineering paper, but it is nevertheless true that the ability required for responsible positions in commercial life is of a very much higher order than is required for engineering. That this is so is proved by the fact that the highest salaries are paid to, and the largest fortunes are made by, the clear-headed, cool men of business. One word more. As Mr. Cuthbert Hall will know well, the salaries of young or of old engineers are ruled by the same law of supply and demand that governs every other transaction in our daily life.-Yours, etc., SYDNEY F. WALKER.

The average value of the ordinary inland telegrams was 7.87d. as compared with 7.95d. for 1889-90. The increase in the number of inland telegrams is at the rate of 6.5 per cent. as compared with 8.5 per cent, increase in the preceding year, a diminution probably due to no small extent to the increasing use of the telephone both in the metropolis and chief provincial towns as well as between the busy centres. The increase in the number of Press telegrams has been at rather more than the usual rate. The highest rate * From the Postmaster-General's Report,

of increase, 19 per cent., has, as usual, been shown in the telegrams sent by railway companies without payment. These telegrams, which numbered 116,000 in 1871, had increased in 1876 to 243,633, in 1880 to 431,598, in 1885-86 to 734,641, and in 1890-91 reached a total number of 1,535,067. At 8d. each the value of these telegrams would be about £51,000. At 1s. each, which is probably nearer their actual value, the amount would be about £76,500. The following table gives the revenue and the total cost of the telegraph service, taking into account the interest on capital expenditure, in each of the last seven years:

* The annual interest on the capital sum of £10,880,571 raised by the Government for the purchase of telegraphs, amounting to Interest has been paid at the rate of 23 per cent. instead of 3 per cent. since the 1st April, 1889. The expenses of conversion in 1889 amounted to £27,370.

£229,216, is not borne on the Post Office Votes.

The chief novelty in the telegraph service has been the construction of a telephone line between London and Paris, which was accomplished last winter in somewhat trying circumstances. The cable between St. Margaret's Bay, near Dover, and Sangatte, near Calais, contains four copper wires of larger size than those generally used for telegraphs.

Much trouble was necessary in selecting the route for the land line in England so as to avoid laying any parts of the line underground, which would have rendered its working very uncertain. This danger has, however, been removed, and I am glad to be able to report that conversations by telephone can now be most satisfactorily maintained between the two capitals.

The line was opened for use on April 1 at a charge of 8s. for a conversation of three minutes.

Some improvements have been effected in the form of Wheatstone automatic receivers in use on fast-speed telegraph circuits. These instruments as improved by the department can now, under experimental conditions, record no less than 600 words a minute transmitted over a single wire, while a speed of about 400 words a minute can be conveniently and safely used in practical working, a very satisfactory result compared with the modest rate of 60 or 70 words a minute which obtained in 1870. By the use of new and ingenious tools specially designed for the construction of telephone switchboards a considerable saving in cost of manufacture has been made, and I am glad to say that all parts of the Hughes instruments in use on the continental circuits can now be made in the Post Office factory, so that the department is no longer dependent on a foreign. supply.

On the 16th May, 1890, the seventh International Telegraph Conference assembled in Paris to review the regulations and tariffs agreed upon at the conference at Berlin in 1885. The changes embodied in the convention signed on the 21st June, 1890, took effect on the 1st instant, and their effect will be described in my next annual report.

UNDERGROUND LIGHTING MAINS IN PARIS.* BY E. DIEUDONNÉ. (Continued from page 347.)

The space underneath the pavement is sometimes already so full that room cannot be found for the conduit, which is of considerable size, even when the number of cables is restricted. In these cases, a species of earthenware drain * From L'Electricien.

FIG. 36A.

FIG. 37.

O

FIG. 36.

FIG. 36B.

FIG. 40.

then, lastly, screwed together by bolts between the jaws of a split cylindrical clamp and embedded in a mass of solder. The strips when used are connected together by iron plates, bolted firmly against each other, Fig. 41. After the plates are screwed up, melted solder is poured in, forming a perfect contact.

The junctions of strips with cables is made by means of clamps of a special type, of which one end forms a cylindrical space for reception of the cable, and the other end a flat support for the strip. The whole having been

FIG. 46.

B

FIG. 47.

piece, the connections being made by means of lead

cut-outs.

This arrangement has not been found as practicable as was expected. In time the insulation of the slate slabs becomes defective. The system has therefore been replaced by that shown in Fig. 47. Bronze connecting-pieces are fastened upon porcelain insulators, whose tops are spread out and flattened into the form of a tablet.

FIG. 48.

are laid about 18in. square, held down by bolts, and asphalted at the top exactly as the pit covers.

Fig. 48 shows in section an underground gallery-the cables ranged along its piers, the positives one side, the negatives the other. The gallery represented contains the whole of the cables coming from the central station of the Rue de Bondy, and going towards the Place de la Republique.

SOME DETAILS OF THE CARE AND MANAGEMENT OF AN ARC LIGHTING SYSTEM AS PRACTISED IN THE MUNICIPAL OF ST. LOUIS.*

BY JAMES I. AYER.

(Continued from page 353.)

There are very many details of construction, as well as of office work, which could be referred to if it were not that this paper is now too long, but I will be glad to furnish a copy of "General Instructions to Employés," used in the government of this plant, which refer to and bring out some points of management which are not mentioned here, to those who care for them.

Mr. Ayer remarked that as his paper was printed and in the hands of the members, he would not take the time to read it, but would make some additional remarks. said:

He

One point I touch on in the beginning, where I say that I think that our meetings should be largely "experience meetings." I think you will all agree with me in that statement. The practice we have had here of meeting in the morning, carrying our meetings along until we get through the programme laid out, results in this-that if there is much discussion of the papers, or much interest developed in the matters that come before you here, you delay other matters, and carry the work over very close to some entertainment, or into the dinner hour, and this somePaper read before the Convention of the National Electr Light Association,