The life of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Civil Engineer Part 54

I am much obliged to you for your letter. I am sorry to find, however, that the impression, a very erroneous one as I believe, remains upon your mind that the a.s.sistant engineers are predisposed to encourage, or at all events allow, improper conduct on the part either of contractors or the inferior agents of the Company....

From some experience in these matters it is that I have come to the conclusion that it is wise (however strange you may think the doctrine to be) to shut one's ears and eyes really and truly to everything which does not come forward in such a shape as to demand and admit of an enquiry; and it is for this reason also that I do entertain the opinion very strongly (in which you appear to differ from me), that it is not the interest, it is not wise, and therefore only it is not the duty of Directors to look after, or to see into, the smaller details of the conduct of an establishment which, being of a very temporary, changing, and uncertain character, cannot at the best be conducted with the discipline and regularity of a permanent establishment, in which the parties have their clearly defined and unchanging duties, and look forward to the permanent occupation of their places as their means of support.

At all events, when the Directors see anything they think desirable to correct or to modify, they can fully communicate it to me without the possibility of giving to me any soreness of feeling, which it is always desirable not to excite, even in the case of the lowest menial whose best services one wishes to have and use.

III.

December 12, 1851.

With reference to your letter of December 11, stating that the Directors 'are satisfied that great irregularities have existed, and that they feel it to be their duty, and will not hesitate on any occasion, to represent to me any irregularity on the part of my staff that may come to their knowledge,' I am almost afraid, unless in a short note you may have failed to convey to me the meaning of the Directors, that they greatly misunderstand my feelings on the subject; my great desire, as great as, possibly greater than even that of the Directors, who cannot feel so personally responsible as I do for the efficiency of my staff--my great desire I say is to hear immediately from anybody, and particularly of course from a Director, of any supposed irregularity; and I should feel that I had ground of complaint even if any such report or any suspicion of any irregularity were not immediately communicated to me. The moment that the Directors could doubt my being as anxious as they can be to know and to remedy any irregularity, or that they should look upon me in such matters otherwise than as one of themselves, I should feel that I had lost their confidence, and could no longer carry on satisfactorily to myself my duties, and should therefore resign them. Such must, I beg, be our relative position as regards the future; and carrying out this principle as regards the past, I must beg of them to tell me explicitly what are the irregularities to which they refer as having been committed. I ought to be fully informed of such things--indeed, nothing ought to be suspected even without my knowing; for if _I_ ought not to know, who ought?

As a matter of form, and to be strictly correct, I must guard myself against being supposed to mean that I could desire or approve of what the Directors I am sure would also disapprove of--namely, a system of fault-seeking--because in a very numerous staff or body of men, particularly where they have not the benefit of permanent situations, the perfection of regularity cannot be hoped for; what I princ.i.p.ally seek and require of my a.s.sistants is an honest discharge of their duties, and any departure from this it is well known amongst them I never overlook. Have the goodness, therefore, to ascertain for me, and to let me know immediately, what these irregularities have been.

A few words may here be added on Mr. Brunel's practice in reference to taking pupils.

Although many of his a.s.sistants had been his pupils, he did not encourage young men to come to him with the object of learning their profession in his office. He never absolutely declined to take pupils; but he endeavoured, by fixing a high premium, to reduce the number of applicants.

He did not profess to do more for his pupils than to give them the opportunities of seeing work, afforded by his office, and the chance of being afterwards employed as his a.s.sistants. He attached much importance to private study of mathematics and other branches of science.

Pa.s.sing on to the position a.s.sumed by Mr. Brunel in his relations to the profession at large;--it may be stated in a few words, that he was desirous on all occasions of promoting its welfare by encouraging friendly intercourse among its members, by healing strife, by suppressing as far as he could all cant or pretension, and by setting his face steadfastly against all attempts to fetter the freedom of invention or to lessen the independence of engineers by State patronage or control.

It may appear strange to affirm of one who was foremost in almost all the professional contests of his time, that he was zealous in healing strife; but it is nevertheless true that Mr. Brunel, while he was a bold and uncompromising advocate of his own schemes, was at the same time untiring in his exertions to limit the area of controversy, to confine it strictly within its proper bounds, and to divest it of all personality or of anything which could lead to unpleasant feeling or annoyance.

His endeavours to this end were greatly helped by the friendly relations which he maintained at all times with his professional brethren. He never allowed any divergence of opinion to interfere with private friends.h.i.+p; and, even in the height of controversy, he was glad to give, and ready to ask for, advice on matters connected with the scientific departments of civil engineering.

It is but seldom that extracts have been made from Mr. Brunel's private journals; but it may be permitted, in ill.u.s.tration of what has been said on this point, to give the following pa.s.sage, written during the great contests of the year 1846.

May 5, 1846.

I am just returned from spending an evening with R. Stephenson. It is very delightful, in the midst of our incessant personal professional contests, carried to the extreme limit of fair opposition, to meet him on a perfectly friendly footing, and discuss engineering points.... Again I cannot help recording the great pleasure I derive from these occasional though rare meetings.

Mr. Brunel's opinions on the working of the patent laws will be given below, as following more fitly after extracts from his correspondence relating to the position of his profession in regard to the Government; but, before entering upon that subject, a few words may be said in reference to a cla.s.s of persons who formed a very large proportion of his correspondents--the cla.s.s of 'Inventors.'

He used to receive numerous applications from persons who had invented, or who thought they had invented, some useful contrivance, from a locomotive which would save fifty per cent. in fuel over those then in use, to a machine which, as Mr. Brunel a.s.sured its inventor, 'would not even have a tendency to move.' He was always ready to encourage inventions which seemed likely to produce good results, and to enquire into their merits, if they were patented; but not otherwise, lest it should be said that confidence had been placed in him.

The following is one of the many letters he had to write in answer to requests of this nature.

September 17, 1847.

I could not have complied with your request of giving any opinion upon the merits of the invention. Simple as such an act may be, it too frequently involves one in controversy; and I never found, before I made the rule not to give opinions, that my advice was ever followed, if it was to discourage the inventor from further expense and trouble.

I should tell you in this case that the idea of dovetailing, which in your first letter I find was the principle of the invention, had long before been worked out in every shape and form that ingenuity or blundering could possibly give it.

Upon the important question how far, if at all, the practice of civil engineers should be subject to State control, Mr. Brunel held very decided views. He was strongly opposed both to any interference on the part of the State with the freedom of civil engineers in the conduct of their professional work, and to the recognition of merit by the bestowal of honours or rewards.

_On the Royal Commission on the Application of Iron to Railway Structures._[191]

March 13, 1848.

I regret that the Commissioners should have done me the honour of requesting 'my opinion upon the enquiry referred to them;' because, as it is known to one or more of these Commissioners that I have expressed very strongly, both publicly and privately, my doubts of the advantage of such an enquiry, and my fears of its being, on the contrary, productive of much mischief, both to science and to the profession, it would expose me to a charge of weakness and of inconsistency if I were now to refrain from expressing those opinions, which otherwise I had no idea of intruding upon the Commissioners; and, indeed, I had hoped that, by making those opinions known to some of the members, I might have been pa.s.sed over, and not invited to a.s.sist in the proceedings.

I shall be most happy to communicate, as I am at all times most anxious to do, any knowledge which I may obtain in the course of my practice, and such intercommunication of ideas and of experience amongst engineers I believe to be most useful; but the attempt to collect and re-issue as facts, with the stamp of authority, all that may be offered gratuitously to a Commission in the shape of evidence or opinions, to stamp with the same mark of value statements and facts, hasty opinions and well-considered and matured convictions, the good and the bad, the metal and the dross (and simple courtesy to the donors must prevent the Commissioners from attempting to draw distinctions which might appear invidious)--this, I believe, always has rendered, and always will render, such collections of miscalled evidence injurious instead of advantageous to science; and the facts or statements and opinions so collected will form generally, I believe, a lower average of information than that which is already in the possession, or at least within the reach, of those who have occasion to study the subject: for it is remarkable that in this particular enquiry the Commissioners can have no peculiar means of obtaining, and, as I believe, cannot hope to get better or more extended information than that possessed by any one of the princ.i.p.al engineers of the day; while they will be compelled to receive and to publish much that a prudent man, acting on his own responsibility, would either not have attended to, or would silently have rejected. This, however, is perhaps a negative evil, or, at most, one which cannot much affect the proceedings of the well-informed in our profession; but the mischief which I antic.i.p.ate is much more dangerous to the progress of science.

If the Commission is to enquire into the conditions '_to be observed_,' it is to be presumed that they will give the result of their enquiries; or, in other words, that they will lay down, or at least suggest, 'rules' and 'conditions to be (hereafter) observed'

in the construction of bridges, or, in other words, embarra.s.s and shackle the progress of improvement to-morrow by recording and registering as law the prejudices or errors of to-day.

Nothing, I believe, has tended more to distinguish advantageously the profession of engineering in England and in America, nothing has conduced more to the great advance made in our profession and to our pre-eminence in the real practical application of the science, than the absence of all _regles de l'art_--a term which I fear is now going to be translated into English by the words 'conditions to be observed.' No man, however bold or however high he may stand in his profession, can resist the benumbing effect of rules laid down by authority. Occupied as leading men are, they could not afford the time, or trouble, or responsibility of constantly fighting against them--they would be compelled to abandon all idea of improving upon them; while incompetent men might commit the grossest blunder provided they followed the rules.

For, in the simplest branch of construction, rules may be followed literally without any security as to the result. There is hardly a branch of engineering that could have been selected which in its present state is less capable of being made the subject of fixed laws or instructions than the application of iron to railway structures, and certainly there is no branch in which there is more room for improvement, or which offers so many different channels or directions for that improvement.

In the quality of the material, the workmans.h.i.+p, or the mode of manufacture, and in the application of it, there is every imaginable variety, there is room for almost any imaginable degree or nature of improvement; and unless the Commissioners are endowed with prophetic powers, it is impossible that they can now foresee what may be the result of changes in any one of these conditions.[192] ...

What rules or 'conditions to be observed' could be drawn up now that would not become, not merely worthless, but totally erroneous and misleading, under such improved circ.u.mstances? But above all, I fear--nay, I feel convinced--that any attempt to establish any rules, any publication of opinions which may create or guide public prejudice, any suggestions coming from authority, must close the door to improvement in any direction but that pointed out by the Commissioners, and must tend to lead and direct, and therefore to control and to limit, the number of the roads now open for advance.

I believe that nothing could tend more to arrest improvement than such a.s.sistance, and that any attempt to fix now, or at any given period, the conditions to be thereafter observed in the mode of construction of any specific work of art, and thus to dictate for the present and for the future the theory which is to be adopted as the correct one in any branch of engineering, is contrary to all sound philosophy, and will be productive of great mischief, in tending to check and to control the extent and direction of all improvements, and preventing that rapid advance in the useful application of science to mechanics which has resulted from the free exercise of engineering skill in this country, subjected as it ever is, under the present system, to the severe and unerring control and test of competing skill and of public opinion. Devoted as I am to my profession, I see with fear and regret that this tendency to legislate and to rule, which is the fas.h.i.+on of the day, is flowing in our direction.

I must repeat my regret that circ.u.mstances should have forced me to intrude these my opinions upon the Commissioners; but, for the reasons I have before given, the application to me, after the part I have taken, left me no alternative; but having expressed my opinions, and respectfully protested against the objects and proceedings of the Commissioners, I shall feel it my duty to attend to their summons, and afford any information in my power.

_On a Proposal to obtain the Recognition in England of Decorations conferred at the Paris Exhibition of 1855._

February 9, 1856.

I regretted to be under the necessity of declining to sign the memorial that was brought to me by a gentleman introducing himself with your card, without an opportunity of explaining to you my reasons; and it would be difficult to do so satisfactorily without an opportunity of personal explanation. In a few words, however, I will state that I disapprove strongly, and after full consideration, of any introduction into England of the system of distinctions conferred by Government upon individuals, whether engaged in professions, arts, or manufactures, whose merits can be so much better and more surely marked by public opinion. In countries where public opinion is not so searching and so powerful as in England, the evils of favouritism may be out-balanced by the advantages of some means of distinguis.h.i.+ng men. I admit the possibility, though I doubt the fact; but I feel sure that the evils would be far greater than the advantages in England. The few cases of knighthood conferred in England generally follow public opinion, though I should not wish to see this system carried further. Such being my opinion, I could not consistently ask for my own letter of Chevalier de la Legion d'Honneur being recognised here.

On the question of the patent laws, Mr. Brunel held the opinion that the system of protecting inventions by means of letters patent was productive of immense evil. The prominent part which he took in all discussions upon this subject exposed him to much adverse criticism, which was perhaps the more freely bestowed, because it was felt that he was a very formidable opponent, not only from the force of his arguments, but also from the authority with which he spoke.

He was, from the necessity of his position as a civil engineer, himself an inventor; he had in his staff and among those with whom he acted many inventors; he did not, therefore, underrate the benefits conferred on science by those who, by inventing, add to its resources. He was continually being trammelled and thwarted in his various undertakings by patents, and he therefore could judge of their evil effects upon the progress of practical engineering; and, lastly, he had the best possible means of judging of their effects upon the inventors themselves, both from his opportunities of becoming acquainted with the fate of others, and from his own experience. His father, Sir Isambard Brunel, had taken out patents for most of his inventions, and, as Mr. Brunel stated before the House of Lords Committee of 1851, with very unfortunate results, especially in the case of the carbonic-gas engine (see Note B to Chapter I); where, if they had not been obliged to work secretly, in order to conceal the process before the patent was granted, they could have obtained valuable advice, which might either have led to an earlier abandonment of the project, or to its improvement in those points in which it failed.

Mr. Brunel drew up the following statement when asked to give evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Lords in 1851. His evidence will be found at p. 246 of the Minutes of Evidence (ordered to be printed July 1, 1851).

_Memorandum for Evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Lords on the Patent Laws, 1851._

I have for many years had considerable experience of the operation of patents.

I have been engaged under my father in the working out of numerous inventions of his, and the taking out of patents on his account, also in advising others professionally with him, and by myself, and have been engaged in numerous questions of disputes resulting from patents; and I have had frequent occasion to use the patents and inventions of others. I have also had to introduce improvements of my own without patents, and to defend my use of them against patents.

I have thus for the last twenty-eight years been in the midst of everything connected with inventions, and in constant contact with the operation of the patent laws.

I have been behind the scenes the whole time.

The result has been that I have never taken out a patent myself, or ever thought of doing so; and I have gradually become convinced that the whole system of patents is, in the present advanced state of arts and science and manufactures, productive of immense evil.