C.E., &c., to whom the advice and assistance he rendered in early life was most valuable, and it was always gratefully acknowledged. In later years, when Mr. Miller had attained his deservedly high reputation as an Engineer, he delighted to recall the advantages he received from the precepts and example of Mr. Cowen, and they remained fast friends through life.

Mr. Cowen joined the Institution of Civil Engineers as an Associate in the year 1844, and always took much interest in its welfare. "He died on Sunday afternoon, 27th April, 1862, at his house in Devonshire Street, Carlisle, in the 75th year of his age, after a long course of sickness and suffering; but, in the closing stages of his decline, although his bodily strength failed, and his form became greatly attenuated, his mental powers and memory were mercifully preserved to him in perfection, and enabled him to direct all that a man must wish to have done who is conscious that he is on the point of yielding up his breath to Him who gave it. His complaint was hereditary gout of great severity, involving a complication of ills and acute pains. He, however, bore his affliction with fortitude and resignation. He had no desire to live; he

looked beyond this world. He said, in reply to the inquiries of a friend, that he had made his peace.' The troubles and cares of life at an end, he sleeps soundly. Those who well knew him and appreciated his worth will never cease to cherish and honour his memory."

MR. JOHN WITHERS, of Whalley Abbey, joined the Institution of Civil Engineers as an Associate in the year 1857. He died on the 25th October, 1862, at the age of 43 years.

All attempts to obtain materials for a Memoir have been unsuccessful.

MR. JOHN BRANNIS BIRCH, F.G.S., was born in London in the year 1813. He studied architecture and surveying under his father, and subsequently embraced the profession of a Civil Engineer. At an early period of his career he entered into partnership with his brother, Eugenius Birch (M. Inst. C.E.), a connection which continued up to the period of the death of J. B. Birch. He was actively engaged in works of varied character up to 1845, when he took a prominent part, as Engineer, in the parliamentary survey and sections of several important lines of railway. He was then engaged in laying out the section of the East Indian Railway from Calcutta to Delhi, and with his brother designed the whole of the bridges and viaducts, and upon the material thus furnished the guarantee of the line was obtained. He was subsequently employed in the construction of several works of interest

suitable for a school of Engineering than for the Institution. The subject was an old one. Mr. Richard Roberts had supplied duplicate machinery thirty years ago, and for more than twenty years Mr. Beyer had been engaged in making duplicate locomotive engines, and had made such for the greater number of the railways in this country, including the Midland Railway.

Mr. VIGNOLES stated, that Mr. Beyer had manufactured upwards of fifty locomotive engines for the Tudela and Bilbao Railway, which were exact duplicates of each other, and of which all the parts perfectly fitted on their arrival in Spain. He was glad to have this opportunity of expressing his fullest confidence of the way in which the duplicate system had been carried out, and he too was surprised, that it was not more generally known and adopted.

Mr. FERNIE conceded that all honour was due to Mr. Beyer, for the excellent manner in which his work was executed. He quite understood that mode of working, but something more was required, and it should be stated, in justice to the large firms who devoted themselves to railway work, that all of them had for years been aiming at a system of duplicates. The plan now laid before the meeting was, however, different from the others, inasmuch as it was a system of working from known gauges. It was not the custom of railway companies to order all their engines from one maker. Twenty might be purchased from one firm, thirty from another, and so on, and on some lines there were as many as twenty different types of engines. Now, by the system of Mr. Whitworth, all the engines from those various manufacturers would be perfectly alike, whereas, by what might be termed the individual system, only the different lots would be duplicates of one another. There was no doubt that, at the present time, there was a want of uniformity in the dimensions of engines, as supplied by different makers, and what was wanted was, a standard by which all makers should work alike. The parliamentary yard of 36 inches must be the standard, and from the inch, as he had already shown, it was an easy matter to obtain any dimension. He had said that the engines were, as a rule, unlike in their dimensions; but a slight correction was required in this statement, for all the screws were of the same pitch and thread, and every nut would fit every bolt of its own diameter. It was hardly possible to calculate the immense saving to the country through the adoption of Mr. Whitworth's taps and dies; and yet when they were first introduced, they were not generally approved, and one firm in Manchester hesitated for many years, until at last they were compelled to adopt them. No one, he thought, would now raise an argument against them, for their many advantages had been realized; and so with regard to this new system, he expected there would be some opposition to it. This was an age of

precision, and from a careful working for five years on this system, he was satisfied of its practicability, and thought that hereafter it would be carried out with still greater minuteness. He felt certain the time was not far distant, when there would be no more guesswork as to the finer divisions of the inch. It was only necessary to show mechanical men the importance of accuracy of dimensions, and the ease by which that accuracy could be attained, and their own good sense, and desire to excel, would soon prompt them to adopt the new system. This was quite as much a question for the manufacturer as for a railway company. If England was to continue to be the manufactory of the world, let the makers take up this system, and with excellence of material and scientific precision of construction, so attain to the perfection of production.

In pursuance of the notice on the card of the meetings, it was proposed, and resolved unanimously:-"That in order to avoid holding a Meeting on the evening of Whit-Tuesday, the meeting be adjourned until the evening of the 2nd of June."

June 2, 1863.

The Session was concluded by a Conversazione, at which the President received the Members of the Institution, and a numerous circle of distinguished visitors. The rooms were decorated with many choice works of art, and there was also exhibited a large and interesting collection of mechanical models.

[APPENDIX

APPENDIX TO VOL. XXII.

MEMOIRS.

HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS ALBERT FRANCIS AUGUSTUS CHARLES EMMANUEL, DUKE OF SAXE COBOURG AND GOTHA, PRINCE CONSORT, K.G., K.T., K.P., G.C.B., K.S.I., G.C.M.G., &c., &c., was born August 26, 1819. He joined the Institution of Civil Engineers as an Honorary Member on the 7th of March, 1843. H.R.H. died December 14, 1861.

MR. PETER BARLOW was born in Norwich, in October, 1776, and was sent at an early age to a foundation school, where he acquired a good English education. He was then placed in a mercantile establishment in Norwich, and while in that position and still at an early age, he, together with some young friends of a similar turn of mind, formed a juvenile scientific society, where they discussed questions in mathematics and the physical sciences, for which young Barlow had a natural predilection, and eventually by his industry and perseverance he acquired considerable scientific knowledge.

The political excitement of the times broke up this little society, and the members of it became dispersed, some entering the Army and others the Navy, whilst Mr. Barlow, turning his attention to tuition, for which he had partially qualified himself by careful study, although without enjoying the advantage of good masters, obtained the mastership of a school. He soon became a regular correspondent of The Ladies' Diary,' then under the management of Dr. Hutton, Professor of Mathematics at Woolwich, under whose advice Mr. Barlow was induced, in 1801, to become a candidate for the post of additional Mathematical Master at the Royal Military Academy, a position which was only obtained after a severe competitive examination. There he became acquainted with Mr. Bonnycastle, to whose judicious advice and assistance he always acknowledged himself to have been much indebted. Under the same advice he, in 1808, commenced writing for the Encyclopædia' conducted by Dr. Rees, and from the letter H to the end, he contributed the majority of the mathematical articles of that

work. In 1811 he published his first work on the Theory of Numbers,' and in 1814 appeared his Mathematical Dictionary,' and immediately afterwards his Mathematical Tables,' a work which has since been reproduced by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. In 1817 he published the first edition of an Essay on the strength of Timber and other Materials,' founded on experiments made in the Dockyard and the Arsenal at Woolwich, by permission of the Admiralty and of the Board of Ordnance. While thus engaged he became acquainted with the late Thomas Telford, and assisted him in experiments and calculations for his then proposed structure of the Menai Suspension Bridge, and also conducted for him a series of experiments on the tides in the Thames, in reference to the then projected erection of the new London Bridge. In the report upon the latter subject, the effects which the removal of the old London Bridge have since manifested upon the bridges of Westminster and Blackfriars were fully considered. About this time he also contributed many articles to the Encyclopædia Metropolitana.' In 1819 his attention was directed to the variation of the compass needle and the local attraction of ships, and he was induced to undertake a series of experiments, with a view to discover the laws of the reciprocal action subsisting between magnets and simple iron bodies, and to devise some means of correcting the errors of compasses on shipboard. The Government liberally allowed him the facilities which the Dockyard and Arsenal at Woolwich presented for prosecuting these experiments, and the laws of terrestrial magnetism which he, after much labour, discovered were subsequently confirmed by Captain Basil Hall, Captain Mudge, and other officers. These laws and their proposed application for correcting the local attractions of ships formed the subject of his Essay on Magnetic Attractions,' published in 1820. In a second edition of this work, in 1823, it was shown that all the laws which had, up to that time, rested on experimental deductions were consistent with a certain hypothesis of magnetic action, which theory was subsequently elaborated and confirmed in a more general investigation of the subject by M. Poisson, in a memoir read to the Institute of France in 1824. All doubt on the subject being now removed, Mr. Barlow received numerous gratifying marks of approbation. He was elected on the Council of the Royal Society, and received the Copley medal. He also received the reward for useful discoveries, provided by Parliament, in connexion with the then existing Board of Longitude. He further received a handsome personal present from the Emperor of Russia, and was elected a member of the Imperial Academy of Brussels, a corresponding member of the Institute of France, and received many other similar distinctions.

On the 31st of January, 1825, he presented to the Institution of