V THE SCIENTIFIC RESULTS OF THE INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION, LONDON, 1883 A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE EXHIBITION IN JUNE 1883 THE SCIENTIFIC RESULTS OF THE INTERNATIONAL FISHERIES EXHIBITION, LONDON, 1883 THE text which has been selected for the Paper which I have the honour to submit on the present occasion has caused me no little perplexity on account of its ambiguity. It has been pointed out to me that it is unwise to prophesy unless you know, and that no one at present can know what may be the results, scientific or otherwise, of the great Exhibition, which has still some months of its career to run. Again, it is apparent that the word "scientific" has a very wide scope, including statistical, mechanical, hydrographical, biological and sociological results, all of which are in some way or other to be observed and studied in the great International Fisheries Exhibition. The comprehensive vagueness of the title of my discourse has, on the other hand, the advantage that it permits me to choose from a very wide range of subjects, and I have accordingly to submit to you the following as a more exact definition of the matter to which I desire to call your attention. I propose, not to speak so much of scientific results which may flow from the Exhibition, as of scientific results which are illustrated in the Exhibition, and in particular of those results of the science of Zoology which are of importance to the Fish Industry, and are more or less completely set forth for our instruction and edification in the collections which have been brought together in the London International Fisheries Exhibition. It would have been a congenial task to me to describe here some of the rare specimens of great interest to the zoologist, which have been sent by foreign countries to this exhibition. Such specimens as Nordenskjold's Rhytina and the magnificent skeletons of Xiphioid Whales shown in the Swedish Court are of surpassing interest and importance from the zoological point of view. At the same time it must be admitted that they do not have any special importance in relation to Fisheries, and accordingly I must leave unnoticed such rarities and delights of the zoologist, in order to address myself more especially to the question of the relationship of the science of zoology to the fish industry. The value of zoological science in relation to fisheries is not, I think, so fully appreciated in this country as is desirable in the interests of the public, and of those who make profit by enterprise in fisheries. There is a very general tendency among men whose occupations are of a commercial character to undervalue the work of scientific inquiry, not only in regard to such matters as fisheries and fish-culture, but also in relation to manufacturing industries, agriculture, mining, and even in relation to medicine. To a large extent this arises from a misconception as to the real nature and character of what is called "science." Science is the knowledge of causes; its method and purpose when strictly pursued lead to the accumulation and arrangement of thorough and accurate knowledge of any given subject to which it may be applied, with a certainty and an abundance which no other method and no other purpose can give. Undoubtedly the latest scientific knowledge of a subject is very usually not immediately useful to those who are engaged in applying commercial enterprise to the same subject. It is however to be noted, over and over again, that the scientific discovery of one generation becomes the necessary foundation of some valuable commercial enterprise in the next: what was at one time a curiosity and of little interest, save to men of science, becomes after fifty years the pivot of some great industrial manufacture. Accordingly commercial men, and those who place the material well-being of this country beyond all things as an object to be continually striven for, should have patience in the presence of what seem to be the useless accumulations of knowledge; they should have faith in the ultimate utility of science, for already throughout the length and breadth of the land this cause-reaching knowledge, which we call "science," has proved its enormous power of aiding commerce, and has amply established its claim not to mere toleration but to eager and generous support |