Abstract
OUR readers may remember the consternation caused some years ago by the publication of Prof. Jevons's work on our coal supplies, and the alarmed inference drawn from his calculations that the days of Britain's supremacy and prosperity were numbered. Certainly, if our prosperity is entirely dependent on our coal supplies, there can be no doubt that ere very long the beginning of the end will have arrived. Abundant as our coal supplies are their consumption at the rate of about 150 million tons annually cannot go on for ever; and while we may have the ships and the money too, it would be a serious thing for England if she had to look abroad for her greatest source of physical power. It is certainly at present difficult to see how the work of the world could be carried on if the supply of coal were completely exhausted; still if man were compelled to find a substitute or relapse into savagery or even perish altogether, we think the chances are he would be able in some way, without detriment to his progress, to adapt himself to his new circumstances. These ideas have been suggested by an interesting lecture, just published, recently delivered at Glasgow by Dr. C. W. Siemens, βOn the Utilisation of Heat and other Natural Forces.β
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WINDMILLS AND WATERFALLS . Nature 18, 274β276 (1878). https://doi.org/10.1038/018274a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/018274a0