Mrs. Jenkin’s Illness—Captain Jenkin—The Golden Wedding—Death of Uncle
John—Death of Mr. and Mrs. Austin—Illness and Death of the Captain—Death
of Mrs. Jenkin—Effect on Fleeming—Telpherage—The End.
AND now I must resume my narrative for that melancholy business that
concludes all human histories. In January of the year 1875, while
Fleeming’s sky was still unclouded, he was reading Smiles. ‘I read my
engineers’ lives steadily,’ he writes, ‘but find biographies depressing.
I suspect one reason to be that misfortunes and trials can be graphically
described, but happiness and the causes of happiness either cannot be or
are not. A grand new branch of literature opens to my view: a drama in
which people begin in a poor way and end, after getting gradually
happier, in an ecstasy of enjoyment. The common novel is not the thing
at all. It gives struggle followed by relief. I want each act to close
on a new and triumphant happiness, which has been steadily growing all
the while. This is the real antithesis of tragedy, where things get
blacker and blacker and end in hopeless woe. Smiles has not grasped my
grand idea, and only shows a bitter struggle followed by a little respite
before death. Some feeble critic might say my new idea was not true to
nature. I’m sick of this old-fashioned notion of art. Hold a mirror up,
indeed! Let’s paint a picture of how things ought to be and hold that up
to nature, and perhaps the poor old woman may repent and mend her ways.’
The ‘grand idea’ might be possible in art; not even the ingenuity of
nature could so round in the actual life of any man. And yet it might
almost seem to fancy that she had read the letter and taken the hint; for
to Fleeming the cruelties of fate were strangely blended with tenderness,
and when death came, it came harshly to others, to him not unkindly.
In the autumn of that same year 1875, Fleeming’s father and mother were
walking in the garden of their house at Merchiston, when the latter fell
to the ground. It was thought at the time to be a stumble; it was in all
likelihood a premonitory stroke of palsy. From that day, there fell upon
her an abiding panic fear; that glib, superficial part of us that speaks
and reasons could allege no cause, science itself could find no mark of
danger, a son’s solicitude was laid at rest; but the eyes of the body saw
the approach of a blow, and the consciousness of the body trembled at its
coming. It came in a moment; the brilliant, spirited old lady leapt from
her bed, raving. For about six months, this stage of her disease
continued with many painful and many pathetic circumstances; her husband
who tended her, her son who was unwearied in his visits, looked for no
change in her condition but the change that comes to all. ‘Poor mother,’
I find Fleeming writing, ‘I cannot get the tones of her voice out of my
head. . . I may have to bear this pain for a long time; and so I am
bearing it and sparing myself whatever pain seems useless. Mercifully I
do sleep, I am so weary that I must sleep.’ And again later: ‘I could do
very well, if my mind did not revert to my poor mother’s state whenever I
stop attending to matters immediately before me.’ And the next day: ‘I
can never feel a moment’s pleasure without having my mother’s suffering
recalled by the very feeling of happiness. A pretty, young face recalls
hers by contrast—a careworn face recalls it by association. I tell you,
for I can speak to no one else; but do not suppose that I wilfully let my
mind dwell on sorrow.’
In the summer of the next year, the frenzy left her; it left her stone
deaf and almost entirely aphasic, but with some remains of her old sense
and courage. Stoutly she set to work with dictionaries, to recover her
lost tongues; and had already made notable progress, when a third stroke
scattered her acquisitions. Thenceforth, for nearly ten years, stroke
followed upon stroke, each still further jumbling the threads of her
intelligence, but by degrees so gradual and with such partiality of loss
and of survival, that her precise state was always and to the end a
matter of dispute. She still remembered her friends; she still loved to
learn news of them upon the slate; she still read and marked the list of
the subscription library; she still took an interest in the choice of a
play for the theatricals, and could remember and find parallel passages;
but alongside of these surviving powers, were lapses as remarkable, she
misbehaved like a child, and a servant had to sit with her at table. To
see her so sitting, speaking with the tones of a deaf mute not always to
the purpose, and to remember what she had been, was a moving appeal to
all who knew her. Such was the pathos of these two old people in their
affliction, that even the reserve of cities was melted and the neighbours
vied in sympathy and kindness. Where so many were more than usually
helpful, it is hard to draw distinctions; but I am directed and I delight
to mention in particular the good Dr. Joseph Bell, Mr. Thomas, and Mr.
Archibald Constable with both their wives, the Rev. Mr. Belcombe (of
whose good heart and taste I do not hear for the first time—the news had
come to me by way of the Infirmary), and their next-door neighbour,
unwearied in service, Miss Hannah Mayne. Nor should I omit to mention
that John Ruffini continued to write to Mrs. Jenkin till his own death,
and the clever lady known to the world as Vernon Lee until the end: a
touching, a becoming attention to what was only the wreck and survival of
their brilliant friend.
But he to whom this affliction brought the greatest change was the
Captain himself. What was bitter in his lot, he bore with unshaken
courage; only once, in these ten years of trial, has Mrs. Fleeming Jenkin
seen him weep; for the rest of the time his wife—his commanding officer,
now become his trying child—was served not with patience alone, but with
a lovely happiness of temper. He had belonged all his life to the
ancient, formal, speechmaking, compliment-presenting school of courtesy;
the dictates of this code partook in his eyes of the nature of a duty;
and he must now be courteous for two. Partly from a happy illusion,
partly in a tender fraud, he kept his wife before the world as a still
active partner. When he paid a call, he would have her write ‘with love’
upon a card; or if that (at the moment) was too much, he would go armed
with a bouquet and present it in her name. He even wrote letters for her
to copy and sign: an innocent substitution, which may have caused
surprise to Ruffini or to Vernon Lee, if they ever received, in the hand
of Mrs. Jenkin the very obvious reflections of her husband. He had
always adored this wife whom he now tended and sought to represent in
correspondence: it was now, if not before, her turn to repay the
compliment; mind enough was left her to perceive his unwearied kindness;
and as her moral qualities seemed to survive quite unimpaired, a childish
love and gratitude were his reward. She would interrupt a conversation
to cross the room and kiss him. If she grew excited (as she did too
often) it was his habit to come behind her chair and pat her shoulder;
and then she would turn round, and clasp his hand in hers, and look from
him to her visitor with a face of pride and love; and it was at such
moments only that the light of humanity revived in her eyes. It was hard
for any stranger, it was impossible for any that loved them, to behold
these mute scenes, to recall the past, and not to weep. But to the
Captain, I think it was all happiness. After these so long years, he had
found his wife again; perhaps kinder than ever before; perhaps now on a
more equal footing; certainly, to his eyes, still beautiful. And the
call made on his intelligence had not been made in vain. The merchants
of Aux Cayes, who had seen him tried in some ‘counter-revolution’ in
1845, wrote to the consul of his ‘able and decided measures,’ ‘his cool,
steady judgment and discernment’ with admiration; and of himself, as ‘a
credit and an ornament to H. M. Naval Service.’ It is plain he must have
sunk in all his powers, during the years when he was only a figure, and
often a dumb figure, in his wife’s drawing-room; but with this new term
of service, he brightened visibly. He showed tact and even invention in
managing his wife, guiding or restraining her by the touch, holding
family worship so arranged that she could follow and take part in it. He
took (to the world’s surprise) to reading—voyages, biographies, Blair’s
_Sermons_, even (for her letter’s sake) a work of Vernon Lee’s, which
proved, however, more than he was quite prepared for. He shone more, in
his remarkable way, in society; and twice he had a little holiday to
Glenmorven, where, as may be fancied, he was the delight of the
Highlanders. One of his last pleasures was to arrange his dining-room.
Many and many a room (in their wandering and thriftless existence) had he
seen his wife furnish with exquisite taste, and perhaps with
‘considerable luxury’: now it was his turn to be the decorator. On the
wall he had an engraving of Lord Rodney’s action, showing the _Prothée_,
his father’s ship, if the reader recollects; on either side of this on
brackets, his father’s sword, and his father’s telescope, a gift from
Admiral Buckner, who had used it himself during the engagement; higher
yet, the head of his grandson’s first stag, portraits of his son and his
son’s wife, and a couple of old Windsor jugs from Mrs. Buckner’s. But
his simple trophy was not yet complete; a device had to be worked and
framed and hung below the engraving; and for this he applied to his
daughter-in-law: ‘I want you to work me something, Annie. An anchor at
each side—an anchor—stands for an old sailor, you know—stands for hope,
you know—an anchor at each side, and in the middle THANKFUL.’ It is not
easy, on any system of punctuation, to represent the Captain’s speech.
Yet I hope there may shine out of these facts, even as there shone
through his own troubled utterance, some of the charm of that delightful
spirit.
In 1881, the time of the golden wedding came round for that sad and
pretty household. It fell on a Good Friday, and its celebration can
scarcely be recalled without both smiles and tears. The drawing-room was
filled with presents and beautiful bouquets; these, to Fleeming and his
family, the golden bride and bridegroom displayed with unspeakable pride,
she so painfully excited that the guests feared every moment to see her
stricken afresh, he guiding and moderating her with his customary tact
and understanding, and doing the honours of the day with more than his
usual delight. Thence they were brought to the dining-room, where the
Captain’s idea of a feast awaited them: tea and champagne, fruit and
toast and childish little luxuries, set forth pell-mell and pressed at
random on the guests. And here he must make a speech for himself and his
wife, praising their destiny, their marriage, their son, their
daughter-in-law, their grandchildren, their manifold causes of gratitude:
surely the most innocent speech, the old, sharp contemner of his
innocence now watching him with eyes of admiration. Then it was time for
the guests to depart; and they went away, bathed, even to the youngest
child, in tears of inseparable sorrow and gladness, and leaving the
golden bride and bridegroom to their own society and that of the hired
nurse.
It was a great thing for Fleeming to make, even thus late, the
acquaintance of his father; but the harrowing pathos of such scenes
consumed him. In a life of tense intellectual effort, a certain
smoothness of emotional tenor were to be desired; or we burn the candle
at both ends. Dr. Bell perceived the evil that was being done; he
pressed Mrs. Jenkin to restrain her husband from too frequent visits; but
here was one of those clear-cut, indubitable duties for which Fleeming
lived, and he could not pardon even the suggestion of neglect.
And now, after death had so long visibly but still innocuously hovered
above the family, it began at last to strike and its blows fell thick and
heavy. The first to go was uncle John Jenkin, taken at last from his
Mexican dwelling and the lost tribes of Israel; and nothing in this
remarkable old gentleman’s life, became him like the leaving of it. His
sterling, jovial acquiescence in man’s destiny was a delight to Fleeming.
‘My visit to Stowting has been a very strange but not at all a painful
one,’ he wrote. ‘In case you ever wish to make a person die as he ought
to die in a novel,’ he said to me, ‘I must tell you all about my old
uncle.’ He was to see a nearer instance before long; for this family of
Jenkin, if they were not very aptly fitted to live, had the art of manly
dying. Uncle John was but an outsider after all; he had dropped out of
hail of his nephew’s way of life and station in society, and was more
like some shrewd, old, humble friend who should have kept a lodge; yet he
led the procession of becoming deaths, and began in the mind of Fleeming
that train of tender and grateful thought, which was like a preparation
for his own. Already I find him writing in the plural of ‘these
impending deaths’; already I find him in quest of consolation. ‘There is
little pain in store for these wayfarers,’ he wrote, ‘and we have
hope—more than hope, trust.’
On May 19, 1884, Mr. Austin was taken. He was seventy-eight years of
age, suffered sharply with all his old firmness, and died happy in the
knowledge that he had left his wife well cared for. This had always been
a bosom concern; for the Barrons were long-lived and he believed that she
would long survive him. But their union had been so full and quiet that
Mrs. Austin languished under the separation. In their last years, they
would sit all evening in their own drawing-room hand in hand: two old
people who, for all their fundamental differences, had yet grown together
and become all the world in each other’s eyes and hearts; and it was felt
to be a kind release, when eight months after, on January 14, 1885, Eliza
Barron followed Alfred Austin. ‘I wish I could save you from all pain,’
wrote Fleeming six days later to his sorrowing wife, ‘I would if I
could—but my way is not God’s way; and of this be assured,—God’s way is
best.’
In the end of the same month, Captain Jenkin caught cold and was confined
to bed. He was so unchanged in spirit that at first there seemed no
ground of fear; but his great age began to tell, and presently it was
plain he had a summons. The charm of his sailor’s cheerfulness and
ancient courtesy, as he lay dying, is not to be described. There he lay,
singing his old sea songs; watching the poultry from the window with a
child’s delight; scribbling on the slate little messages to his wife, who
lay bed-ridden in another room; glad to have Psalms read aloud to him, if
they were of a pious strain—checking, with an ‘I don’t think we need read
that, my dear,’ any that were gloomy or bloody. Fleeming’s wife coming
to the house and asking one of the nurses for news of Mrs. Jenkin,
‘Madam, I do not know,’ said the nurse; ‘for I am really so carried away
by the Captain that I can think of nothing else.’ One of the last
messages scribbled to his wife and sent her with a glass of the champagne
that had been ordered for himself, ran, in his most finished vein of
childish madrigal: ‘The Captain bows to you, my love, across the table.’
When the end was near and it was thought best that Fleeming should no
longer go home but sleep at Merchiston, he broke his news to the Captain
with some trepidation, knowing that it carried sentence of death.
‘Charming, charming—charming arrangement,’ was the Captain’s only
commentary. It was the proper thing for a dying man, of Captain Jenkin’s
school of manners, to make some expression of his spiritual state; nor
did he neglect the observance. With his usual abruptness, ‘Fleeming,’
said he, ‘I suppose you and I feel about all this as two Christian
gentlemen should.’ A last pleasure was secured for him. He had been
waiting with painful interest for news of Gordon and Khartoum; and by
great good fortune, a false report reached him that the city was
relieved, and the men of Sussex (his old neighbours) had been the first
to enter. He sat up in bed and gave three cheers for the Sussex
regiment. The subsequent correction, if it came in time, was prudently
withheld from the dying man. An hour before midnight on the fifth of
February, he passed away: aged eighty-four.
Word of his death was kept from Mrs. Jenkin; and she survived him no more
than nine and forty hours. On the day before her death, she received a
letter from her old friend Miss Bell of Manchester, knew the hand, kissed
the envelope, and laid it on her heart; so that she too died upon a
pleasure. Half an hour after midnight, on the eighth of February, she
fell asleep: it is supposed in her seventy-eighth year.
Thus, in the space of less than ten months, the four seniors of this
family were taken away; but taken with such features of opportunity in
time or pleasant courage in the sufferer, that grief was tempered with a
kind of admiration. The effect on Fleeming was profound. His pious
optimism increased and became touched with something mystic and filial.
‘The grave is not good, the approaches to it are terrible,’ he had
written in the beginning of his mother’s illness: he thought so no more,
when he had laid father and mother side by side at Stowting. He had
always loved life; in the brief time that now remained to him, he seemed
to be half in love with death. ‘Grief is no duty,’ he wrote to Miss
Bell; ‘it was all too beautiful for grief,’ he said to me; but the
emotion, call it by what name we please, shook him to his depths; his
wife thought he would have broken his heart when he must demolish the
Captain’s trophy in the dining-room, and he seemed thenceforth scarcely
the same man.
These last years were indeed years of an excessive demand upon his
vitality; he was not only worn out with sorrow, he was worn out by hope.
The singular invention to which he gave the name of telpherage, had of
late consumed his time, overtaxed his strength and overheated his
imagination. The words in which he first mentioned his discovery to
me—‘I am simply Alnaschar’—were not only descriptive of his state of
mind, they were in a sense prophetic; since whatever fortune may await
his idea in the future, it was not his to see it bring forth fruit.
Alnaschar he was indeed; beholding about him a world all changed, a world
filled with telpherage wires; and seeing not only himself and family but
all his friends enriched. It was his pleasure, when the company was
floated, to endow those whom he liked with stock; one, at least, never
knew that he was a possible rich man until the grave had closed over his
stealthy benefactor. And however Fleeming chafed among material and
business difficulties, this rainbow vision never faded; and he, like his
father and his mother, may be said to have died upon a pleasure. But the
strain told, and he knew that it was telling. ‘I am becoming a fossil,’
he had written five years before, as a kind of plea for a holiday visit
to his beloved Italy. ‘Take care! If I am Mr. Fossil, you will be Mrs.
Fossil, and Jack will be Jack Fossil, and all the boys will be little
fossils, and then we shall be a collection.’ There was no fear more
chimerical for Fleeming; years brought him no repose; he was as packed
with energy, as fiery in hope, as at the first; weariness, to which he
began to be no stranger, distressed, it did not quiet him. He feared for
himself, not without ground, the fate which had overtaken his mother;
others shared the fear. In the changed life now made for his family, the
elders dead, the sons going from home upon their education, even their
tried domestic (Mrs. Alice Dunns) leaving the house after twenty-two
years of service, it was not unnatural that he should return to dreams of
Italy. He and his wife were to go (as he told me) on ‘a real honeymoon
tour.’ He had not been alone with his wife ‘to speak of,’ he added,
since the birth of his children. But now he was to enjoy the society of
her to whom he wrote, in these last days, that she was his ‘Heaven on
earth.’ Now he was to revisit Italy, and see all the pictures and the
buildings and the scenes that he admired so warmly, and lay aside for a
time the irritations of his strenuous activity. Nor was this all. A
trifling operation was to restore his former lightness of foot; and it
was a renovated youth that was to set forth upon this reënacted
honeymoon.
The operation was performed; it was of a trifling character, it seemed to
go well, no fear was entertained; and his wife was reading aloud to him
as he lay in bed, when she perceived him to wander in his mind. It is
doubtful if he ever recovered a sure grasp upon the things of life; and
he was still unconscious when he passed away, June the twelfth, 1885, in
the fifty-third year of his age. He passed; but something in his gallant
vitality had impressed itself upon his friends, and still impresses. Not
from one or two only, but from many, I hear the same tale of how the
imagination refuses to accept our loss and instinctively looks for his
reappearing, and how memory retains his voice and image like things of
yesterday. Others, the well-beloved too, die and are progressively
forgotten; two years have passed since Fleeming was laid to rest beside
his father, his mother, and his Uncle John; and the thought and the look
of our friend still haunt us.
APPENDIX.
I. NOTE ON THE CONTRIBUTIONS OF FLEEMING JENKIN TO ELECTRICAL AND
ENGINEERING SCIENCE. BY SIR WILLIAM THOMSON, F.R.S., LL. D., ETC., ETC.
IN the beginning of the year 1859 my former colleague (the first British
University Professor of Engineering), Lewis Gordon, at that time deeply
engaged in the then new work of cable making and cable laying, came to
Glasgow to see apparatus for testing submarine cables and signalling
through them, which I had been preparing for practical use on the first
Atlantic cable, and which had actually done service upon it, during the
six weeks of its successful working between Valencia and Newfoundland.
As soon as he had seen something of what I had in hand, he said to me, ‘I
would like to show this to a young man of remarkable ability, at present
engaged in our works at Birkenhead.’ Fleeming Jenkin was accordingly
telegraphed for, and appeared next morning in Glasgow. He remained for a
week, spending the whole day in my class-room and laboratory, and thus
pleasantly began our lifelong acquaintance. I was much struck, not only
with his brightness and ability, but with his resolution to understand
everything spoken of, to see if possible thoroughly through every
difficult question, and (no if about this!) to slur over nothing. I soon
found that thoroughness of honesty was as strongly engrained in the
scientific as in the moral side of his character.
In the first week of our acquaintance, the electric telegraph and,
particularly, submarine cables, and the methods, machines, and
instruments for laying, testing, and using them, formed naturally the
chief subject of our conversations and discussions; as it was in fact the
practical object of Jenkin’s visit to me in Glasgow; but not much of the
week had passed before I found him remarkably interested in science
generally, and full of intelligent eagerness on many particular questions
of dynamics and physics. When he returned from Glasgow to Birkenhead a
correspondence commenced between us, which was continued without
intermission up to the last days of his life. It commenced with a
well-sustained fire of letters on each side about the physical qualities
of submarine cables, and the practical results attainable in the way of
rapid signalling through them. Jenkin used excellently the valuable
opportunities for experiment allowed him by Newall, and his partner Lewis
Gordon, at their Birkenhead factory. Thus he began definite scientific
investigation of the copper resistance of the conductor, and the
insulating resistance and specific inductive capacity of its gutta-percha
coating, in the factory, in various stages of manufacture; and he was the
very first to introduce systematically into practice the grand system of
absolute measurement founded in Germany by Gauss and Weber. The immense
value of this step, if only in respect to the electric telegraph, is
amply appreciated by all who remember or who have read something of the
history of submarine telegraphy; but it can scarcely be known generally
how much it is due to Jenkin.
Looking to the article ‘Telegraph (Electric)’ in the last volume of the
old edition of the ‘Encyclopædia Britannica,’ which was published about
the year 1861, we find on record that Jenkin’s measurements in absolute
units of the specific resistance of pure gutta-percha, and of the
gutta-percha with Chatterton’s compound constituting the insulation of
the Red Sea cable of 1859, are given as the only results in the way of
absolute measurements of the electric resistance of an insulating
material which had then been made. These remarks are prefaced in the
‘Encyclopædia’ article by the following statement: ‘No telegraphic
testing ought in future to be accepted in any department of telegraphic
business which has not this definite character; although it is only
within the last year that convenient instruments for working, in absolute
measure, have been introduced at all, and the whole system of absolute
measure is still almost unknown to practical electricians.’
A particular result of great importance in respect to testing is referred
to as follows in the ‘Encyclopædia’ article: ‘The importance of having
results thus stated in absolute measure is illustrated by the
circumstance, that the writer has been able at once to compare them, in
the manner stated in a preceding paragraph, with his own previous
deductions from the testings of the Atlantic cable during its manufacture
in 1857, and with Weber’s measurements of the specific resistance of
copper.’ It has now become universally adapted—first of all in England;
twenty-two years later by Germany, the country of its birth; and by
France and Italy, and all the other countries of Europe and
America—practically the whole scientific world—at the Electrical Congress
in Paris in the years 1882 and 1884.
An important paper of thirty quarto pages published in the ‘Transactions
of the Royal Society’ for June 19, 1862, under the title ‘Experimental
Researches on the Transmission of Electric Signals through submarine
cables, Part I. Laws of Transmission through various lengths of one
cable, by Fleeming Jenkin, Esq., communicated by C. Wheatstone, Esq.,
F.R.S.,’ contains an account of a large part of Jenkin’s experimental
work in the Birkenhead factory during the years 1859 and 1860. This
paper is called Part I. Part II. alas never appeared, but something that
it would have included we can see from the following ominous statement
which I find near the end of Part I.: ‘From this value, the
electrostatical capacity per unit of length and the specific inductive
capacity of the dielectric, could be determined. These points will,
however, be more fully treated of in the second part of this paper.’
Jenkin had in fact made a determination at Birkenhead of the specific
inductive capacity of gutta-percha, or of the gutta-percha and
Chatterton’s compound constituting the insulation of the cable, on which
he experimented. This was the very first true measurement of the
specific inductive capacity of a dielectric which had been made after the
discovery by Faraday of the existence of the property, and his primitive
measurement of it for the three substances, glass, shellac, and sulphur;
and at the time when Jenkin made his measurements the existence of
specific inductive capacity was either unknown, or ignored, or denied, by
almost all the scientific authorities of the day.
The original determination of the microfarad, brought out under the
auspices of the British Association Committee on Electrical Standards, is
due to experimental work by Jenkin, described in a paper, ‘Experiments on
Capacity,’ constituting No. IV. of the appendix to the Report presented
by the Committee to the Dundee Meeting of 1867. No other determination,
so far as I know, of this important element of electric measurement has
hitherto been made; and it is no small thing to be proud of in respect to
Jenkin’s fame as a scientific and practical electrician that the
microfarad which we now all use is his.
The British Association unit of electrical resistance, on which was
founded the first practical approximation to absolute measurement on the
system of Gauss and Weber, was largely due to Jenkin’s zeal as one of the
originators, and persevering energy as a working member, of the first
Electrical Standards Committee. The experimental work of first making
practical standards, founded on the absolute system, which led to the
unit now known as the British Association ohm, was chiefly performed by
Clerk Maxwell and Jenkin. The realisation of the great practical benefit
which has resulted from the experimental and scientific work of the
Committee is certainly in a large measure due to Jenkin’s zeal and
perseverance as secretary, and as editor of the volume of Collected
Reports of the work of the Committee, which extended over eight years,
from 1861 till 1869. The volume of Reports included Jenkin’s Cantor
Lectures of January, 1866, ‘On Submarine Telegraphy,’ through which the
practical applications of the scientific principles for which he had
worked so devotedly for eight years became part of general knowledge in
the engineering profession.
Jenkin’s scientific activity continued without abatement to the end. For
the last two years of his life he was much occupied with a new mode of
electric locomotion, a very remarkable invention of his own, to which he
gave the name of ‘Telpherage.’ He persevered with endless ingenuity in
carrying out the numerous and difficult mechanical arrangements essential
to the project, up to the very last days of his work in life. He had
completed almost every detail of the realisation of the system which was
recently opened for practical working at Glynde, in Sussex, four months
after his death.
His book on ‘Magnetism and Electricity,’ published as one of Longman’s
elementary series in 1873, marked a new departure in the exposition of
electricity, as the first text-book containing a systematic application
of the quantitative methods inaugurated by the British Association
Committee on Electrical Standards. In 1883 the seventh edition was
published, after there had already appeared two foreign editions, one in
Italian and the other in German.
His papers on purely engineering subjects, though not numerous, are
interesting and valuable. Amongst these may be mentioned the article
‘Bridges,’ written by him for the ninth edition of the ‘Encyclopædia
Britannica,’ and afterwards republished as a separate treatise in 1876;
and a paper ‘On the Practical Application of Reciprocal Figures to the
Calculation of Strains in Framework,’ read before the Royal Society of
Edinburgh, and published in the ‘Transactions’ of that Society in 1869.
But perhaps the most important of all is his paper ‘On the Application of
Graphic Methods to the Determination of the Efficiency of Machinery,’
read before the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and published in the
‘Transactions,’ vol. xxviii. (1876–78), for which he was awarded the
Keith Gold Medal. This paper was a continuation of the subject treated
in ‘Reulaux’s Mechanism,’ and, recognising the value of that work,
supplied the elements required to constitute from Reulaux’s kinematic
system a full machine receiving energy and doing work.
II. NOTE ON THE WORK OF FLEEMING JENKIN IN CONNECTION WITH SANITARY
REFORM. BY LT. COL. ALEXANDER FERGUSSON.
IT was, I believe, during the autumn of 1877 that there came to Fleeming
Jenkin the first inkling of an idea, not the least in importance of the
many that emanated from that fertile brain, which, with singular
rapidity, took root, and under his careful fostering expanded into a
scheme the fruits of which have been of the utmost value to his
fellow-citizens and others.
The phrase which afterwards suggested itself, and came into use, ‘Healthy
houses,’ expresses very happily the drift of this scheme, and the
ultimate object that Jenkin had in view.
In the summer of that year there had been much talk, and some newspaper
correspondence, on the subject of the unsatisfactory condition of many of
the best houses in Edinburgh as regards their sanitary state. One
gentleman, for example, drew an appalling picture of a large and
expensive house he had bought in the West-end of Edinburgh, fresh from
the builder’s hands. To ascertain precisely what was wrong, and the
steps to be taken to remedy the evils, the effects of which were but too
apparent, obviously demanded the expenditure of much time and careful
study on the part of the intelligent proprietor himself and the
professional experts he had to call in, and, it is needless to add, much
money. There came also, from the poorer parts of the town, the cry that
in many cases the houses of our working people were built anyhow that the
dictates of a narrow economy suggested to the speculative and
irresponsible builder. The horrors of what was called the ‘Sandwich
system,’ amongst other evils, were brought to light. It is sufficient to
say, generally, that this particular practice of the builder consists in
placing in a block of workmen’s houses, to save space and money, the
water cisterns of one flat, directly under the sanitary appliances of the
other, and so on to the top of a house of several storeys. It is easy to
conceive the abominations that must ensue when the leakage of the upper
floors begins to penetrate to the drinking water below. The picture was
a hideous one, apart from the well-known fact that a whole class of
diseases is habitually spread by contaminated water.
In October, 1876, a brisk and interesting discussion had been carried on
in the columns of the _Times_ at intervals during the greater part of
that month, in which the same subject, that of the health and sewage of
towns, had been dealt with by several writers well informed in such
matters. Amongst others, Professor Jenkin himself took part, as did
Professor G. F. Armstrong, who now occupies the chair of Civil
Engineering in Edinburgh. Many of the truths then advanced had been
recently discussed at a meeting of the British Association.
It was while such topics were attracting attention that Fleeming Jenkin’s
family were shocked by the sad intelligence of the loss that friends of
theirs had sustained in the deaths of several of their children from
causes that could be traced up to the unsanitary condition of their
house. Sympathy took the practical form of an intense desire that
something might be done to mitigate the chance of such calamities; and, I
am permitted to say, the result of a home-talk on this subject was an
earnest appeal to the head of the house to turn his scientific knowledge
to account in some way that should make people’s homes more healthy, and
their children’s lives more safe. In answer to the call Jenkin turned
his thoughts in this direction. And the scheme which I shall endeavour
briefly to sketch out was the result.
The obvious remedy for a faulty house is to call in a skilful expert,
architect or engineer, who will doubtless point out by means of reports
and plans what is wrong, and suggest a remedy; but, as remarked by
Professor Jenkin, ‘it has not been the practice for leading engineers to
advise individuals about their house arrangements, except where large
outlay is in contemplation.’ A point of very considerable importance in
such a case as that now supposed.
The problem was to ensure to the great body of the citizens sound
professional advice concerning their houses, such as had hitherto been
only obtainable at great cost—but ‘with due regard to economical
considerations.’
The advantages of co-operation are patent to all. Everyone can
understand how, if a sufficient number of persons combine, there are few
luxuries or advantages that are not within their reach, for a moderate
payment. The advice of a first-rate engineer regarding a dwelling-house
was a palpable advantage; but within the reach of comparatively few. One
has heard of a winter in Madeira being prescribed as the cure for a poor
Infirmary sufferer.
Like most good plans Jenkin’s scheme was simple in the extreme, and
consisted in _combination_ and a small subscription.
‘Just,’ he says, ‘as the leading physician of the day may give his
services to great numbers of poor patients when these are gathered in a
hospital, although he could not practically visit them in their own
houses, so the simple fact of a number of clients gathered into a group
will enable the leading engineer to give them the benefit of his advice.’
But it was his opinion that only ‘continual supervision could secure the
householder from danger due to defects in sanitary appliances.’ He had
in his eye a case precisely similar. The following passage in one of his
first lectures, afterwards repeated frequently, conveys the essence of
Professor Jenkin’s theory, as well as a graceful acknowledgment of the
source from which this happy idea was derived:—
‘An analogous case occurred to him,’ he said, ‘in the “Steam Users’
Association,” in Lancashire. So many boilers burst in that district for
want of inspection that an association was formed for having the boilers
under a continual course of inspection. Let a perfect boiler be bought
from a first-rate maker, the owner has then an apparatus as perfect as it
is now sought to make the sanitary appliances in his house. But in the
course of time the boiler must decay. The prudent proprietor, therefore,
joins the Steam-boiler Association, which, from time to time, examines
his boiler, and by the tests they apply are able to give an absolute
guarantee against accident. This idea of an inspection by an association
was due,’ the lecturer continued, ‘to Sir William Fairbairn, under whom
he had the honour of serving his apprenticeship.’ {288} The steam users
were thus absolutely protected from danger; and the same idea it was
sought to apply to the sanitary system of a house.
To bring together a sufficient number of persons, to form such a ‘group’
as had been contemplated, was the first step to be taken. No time was
lost in taking it. The idea hitherto roughly blocked out was now given a
more definite form. The original sketch, as dictated by Jenkin himself,
is before me, and I cannot do better than transcribe it, seeing it is
short and simple. Several important alterations were afterwards made by
himself in consultation with one or two of his Provisional Council; and
as experience suggested:—
‘The objects of this Association are twofold.
‘1. By taking advantage of the principle of co-operation, to provide
its members at moderate cost with such advice and supervision as
shall ensure the proper sanitary condition of their own dwellings.
‘2. By making use of specially qualified officers to support the
inhabitants and local authorities in enforcing obedience to the
provisions of those laws and by-laws which affect the sanitary
condition of the community.
‘It is proposed that an Association with these objects be formed; and
that all residents within the municipal boundaries of Edinburgh be
eligible as members. That each member of the Association shall
subscribe _one guinea_ annually. That in return for the annual
subscription each member shall be entitled to the following
advantages:—
‘1. A report by the Engineer of the Association on the sanitary
condition of his dwelling, with specific recommendations as to the
improvement of drainage, ventilation, &c., should this be found
necessary.
‘2. The supervision of any alterations in the sanitary fittings of
his dwelling which may be carried out by the advice, or with the
approval, of the officers of the Association.
‘3. An annual inspection of his premises by the Engineer of the
Association, with a report as to their sanitary condition.
‘4. The right, in consideration of a payment of five shillings, of
calling on the Engineer, and legal adviser {290} of the Association
to inspect and report on the existence of any infraction or supposed
infraction of any law affecting the sanitary condition of the
community.
‘It is proposed that the Association should be managed by an unpaid
Council, to be selected by ballot from among its members.
‘That the following salaried officers be engaged by the Association:
‘1. One or more acting engineers, who should give their services
exclusively to the Association.
‘2. A consulting engineer, who should exercise a general
supervision, and advise both on the general principles to be
followed, and on difficult cases.
‘3. A legal agent, to be engaged on such terms as the Council shall
hereafter think fit.
‘4. A permanent secretary.
‘It is also proposed that the officers of the Association should,
with the sanction of the Council, have power to take legal
proceedings against persons who shall, in their opinion, be guilty of
any infraction of sanitary regulations in force throughout the
district; and generally it is intended that the Association shall
further and promote all undertakings which, in their opinion, are
calculated to improve the sanitary condition of Edinburgh and its
immediate neighbourhood.
‘In one aspect this Association will be analogous to the Steam Boiler
Users’ Association, who co-operate in the employment of skilled
inspectors. In a second aspect it will be analogous to the
Association for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, which assists
the community in enforcing obedience to existing laws.’
Towards the end of November, 1877, this paper was handed about among
those who were thought most likely, from their position and public
spirit, to forward such a scheme, so clearly for the good of the
community. Nay more, a systematic ‘canvass’ was set on foot; personal
application the most direct was made use of. The thing was new, and its
advantages not perfectly obvious to all at a glance. Everyone who knows
with what enthusiastic earnestness Jenkin would take hold of, and insist
upon, what he felt to be wholesome and right will understand how he
persisted, how he patiently explained, and swept away objections that
were raised. One could not choose but listen, and understand, and agree.
On the evening of 2nd January, 1878, or, to be more correct, the morning
of the 3rd, two old school-fellows of his at the Edinburgh Academy walked
home with him from an annual dinner of their ‘Class.’ All the way in
glowing language he expounded his views of house inspection, and the
protection of health, asking for sympathy. It was most readily given,
and they parted from him with pleasant words of banter regarding this
vision of his of grafting ‘cleanliness’ upon another quality said to be a
growth, in some sort, of this northern land of ours.
But they reckoned hardly sufficiently on the fact that when Jenkin took a
thing of this kind in hand it must _be_; if it lay within the scope of a
clear head and boundless energy.
Having secured a nucleus of well-wishers, the next step was to enlist the
sympathies of the general public. It was sought to effect this by a
series of public lectures. The first of these (one of two) was given on
22nd January under the auspices of the Edinburgh Philosophical
Institution. It was apparent to the shrewd lecturer that in bringing
before the people a scheme like this, where there was much that was
novel, it was necessary first of all that his audience should be aware of
the evils to which they were exposed in their own houses, before
unfolding a plan for a remedy. The correspondence already referred to as
having been carried on in the summer of the previous year had shown how
crude were the ideas of many persons well informed, or considered to be
so, on this subject. For example, there are few now-a-days who are not
aware that a drain, to be safe, must have at intervals along its course
openings to the upper air, or that it must be ‘ventilated,’ as the phrase
goes. But at the time spoken of there were some who went so far as to
question this principle; even to argue against it; calling forth this
forcible reply—’Here is a pretty farce. You pour out a poison and send
it off on its way to the sea, and forget that on its way there its very
essence will take wings and fly back into your house up the very pipes it
but recently ran down.’ A properly ‘trapped’ and ventilated drain was
the cure for this.
And the lecturer proceeded to show that in Edinburgh, where for the most
part house construction is good and solid, but, as in other towns, the
bulk of the houses were built when the arrangements for internal sewerage
and water supply were very little understood, many serious errors were
made. ‘But,’ the lecturer went on to say, ‘Sanitary Science was now
established on a fairly sound basis, and the germ theory, or theory of
septic ferments, had explained much which used to be obscure. This
theory explained how it was that families might in certain cases live
with fair health for many years in the midst of great filth, while the
dwellers in large and apparently clean mansions were struck down by fever
and diphtheria. The filth which was found compatible with health was
always isolated filth, and until the germs of some specific disease were
introduced, this dirt was merely injurious, not poisonous. The mansions
which were apparently clean and yet fever-visited were found to be those
in which arrangements had been made for the removal of offensive matter,
which arrangements served also to distribute poison germs from one house
to another, from one room to another. These mansions had long suckers
extended from one to another through the common sewer. Through these
suckers, commonly called “house drains,” they imbibed every taint which
any one house in the system could supply. In fact, arrangements were too
often made which simply “laid on” poison to bed-rooms just as gas or
water was laid on. He had known an intelligent person declare that no
harm could come up a certain pipe which ended in a bed-room, because
nothing offensive went down. That person had never realised the fact
that his pipe joined another pipe, which again joined a sewer, which
again whenever there was an epidemic in the neighbourhood, received
innumerable poison germs; and that, although nothing more serious than
scented soap and water went down, the germs of typhoid fever might any
day come up.’
Professor Jenkin then proceeded to show how a house might be absolutely
cut off from all contamination from these sources of evil. Then by means
of large diagrams he showed the several systems of pipes within a house.
One system coloured _red_ showed the pipes that received foul matter. A
system marked in _blue_ showed pipes used to ventilate this red system.
The essential conditions of safety in the internal fittings of a house—it
was inculcated—were that no air to be breathed, no water to be drunk,
should ever be contaminated by connection with _red_ or _blue_ systems.
Then in _yellow_ were shown the pipes which received dirty water, which
was not necessarily foul. Lastly a _white_ system, which under no
circumstances must ever touch the ‘red,’ ‘blue,’ or ‘yellow’ systems.
Such a diagram recalled the complicated anatomical drawings which
illustrate the system of arteries and veins in the human frame. Little
wonder, then, that one gentleman remarked, in perplexity, that he had not
room in his house for such a mass of pipes; but they were already there,
with other pipes besides, all carefully hidden away, as in the human
tenement, with the inevitable result—as the preacher of cleanliness and
health declared—‘out of sight, out of mind.’
In plain and forcible language were demonstrated the ills this product of
modern life is heir to; and the drastic measures that most of them demand
to secure the reputation of a healthy house. Lastly the formation of an
Association to carry out the idea (already sketched) cheaply, was briefly
introduced.
Next morning, January 23rd, was the moment chosen to lay the scheme
formally before the public. In all the Edinburgh newspapers, along with
lengthy reports of the lecture, appeared, in form of an advertisement, a
statement {295} of the scheme and its objects, supported by an imposing
array of ‘Provisional Council.’ In due course several of the Scots
newspapers and others, such as the _Building News_, gave leading
articles, all of them directing attention to this new thing, as ‘an
interesting experiment about to be tried in Edinburgh,’ ‘what promises to
be a very useful sanitary movement, now being organised, and an example
set that may be worthy of imitation elsewhere,’ and so on.
Several of the writers waxed eloquent on the singular ingenuity of the
scheme; the cheap professional advice to its adherents, &c.; and the rare
advantages to be gained by means of co-operation and the traditional ‘one
pound one.’
The Provisional Council was absolutely representative of the community,
and included names more than sufficient to inspire confidence. It
included the Lord-Lieutenant of the county, Lord Rosebery; the Lord
Justice Clerk, Lord Moncrieff; the Lord Advocate; Sir Robert Christison;
several of the Judges of the Court of Session; the Presidents of the
Colleges of Physicians, and of Surgeons; many of the Professors of the
University; the Bishop of Edinburgh, and the Dean; several of the best
known of the Clergy of the Church of Scotland, Established, Free, and of
other branches; one or two members of Parliament; more than one lady (who
should have been perhaps mentioned earlier on this list) well known for
large views and public spirit; several well-known country gentlemen; one
or two distinguished civil engineers and architects; and many gentlemen
of repute for intelligence and business qualities.
Very soon after the second of the promised lectures, the members of the
new Society began to be numbered by hundreds. By the 28th of February,
500 subscribers having been enrolled, they were in a position to hold
their first regular meeting under the presidency of Sir Robert
Christison, when a permanent Council composed of many of those who had
from the first shown an interest in the movement—for example, Professor
(now Sir Douglas) Maclagan and Lord Dean of Guild (now Sir James) Gowans,
Professor Jenkin himself undertaking the duties of Consulting
Engineer—were appointed. And Jenkin was singularly fortunate in securing
as Secretary the late Captain Charles Douglas, a worker as earnest as
himself. It was the theory of the originator that the Council, composed
of leading men not necessarily possessed of engineering knowledge, should
‘give a guarantee to the members that the officials employed should have
been carefully selected, and themselves work under supervision. Every
householder in this town,’ he adds, ‘knows the names of the gentlemen
composing our Council.’
The new Association was a success alike in town and country. Without
going far into statistics it will be evident what scope there was, and
is, for such operations when it is stated that last year (1885) 60 per
cent. of the houses inspected in London and its neighbourhood were found
to have foul air escaping direct into them, and 81 per cent. had their
sanitary appliances in an unsatisfactory state. Here in Edinburgh things
were little, if any, better; as for the country houses, the descriptions
of some were simply appalling. As the new Association continued its
operations it became the _rôle_ of the Consulting Engineer to note such
objections, hypothetical or real, as were raised against the working of
his scheme. Some of these were ingenious enough: but all were replied to
in order, and satisfactorily resolved. It was shown, for example, that
‘you might have a dinner party in your house on the day of your
inspection’; that the Association worked in the utmost harmony with the
city authorities, and with the tradesmen usually employed in such
business; and that the officials were as ‘confidential’ as regards the
infirmities of a house as any physician consulted by a patient. The
strength of the engineering staff has been varied from time to time as
occasion required; at the moment of writing employment is found in
Edinburgh and country districts in various parts of Scotland for five
engineers temporarily or permanently engaged.
The position Jenkin claimed for the Engineers was a high one, but not too
high: thus he well defined it:—
‘In respect of Domestic Sanitation the business of the Engineer and
that of the medical man overlap; for while it is the duty of the
engineer to learn from the doctor what conditions are necessary to
secure health, the engineer may, nevertheless, claim in his turn the
privilege of assisting in the warfare against disease by using his
professional skill to determine what mechanical and constructive
arrangements are best adapted to secure these conditions.’ {299}
Flattery in the form of imitation followed in due course. A branch was
established at St. Andrews, and one of the earliest of similar
institutions was founded at Newport in the United States. Another sprang
up at Wolverhampton. In 1881 two such societies were announced as having
been set on foot in London. And the _Times_ of April 14th, in a leading
article of some length, drew attention to the special features of the
plan which it was stated had followed close upon a paper read by
Professor Fleeming Jenkin before the Society of Arts in the preceding
month of January. The adherents included such names as those of Sir
William Gull, Professor Huxley, Professor Burdon Sanderson, and Sir
Joseph Fayrer. The _Saturday Review_, in January, had already in a
characteristic article enforced the principles of the scheme, and shown
how, for a small annual payment, ‘the helpless and hopeless condition of
the householder at the mercy of the plumber’ might be for ever changed.
The London Association, established on the lines of the parent society,
has been followed by many others year by year; amongst these are
Bradford, Cheltenham, Glasgow, and Liverpool in 1882; Bedford, Brighton,
and Newcastle in 1883; Bath, Cambridge, Cardiff, Dublin, and Dundee in
1884; and Swansea in 1885; and while we write the first steps are being
taken, with help from Edinburgh, to establish an association at Montreal;
sixteen Associations.
Almost, it may be said, a bibliography has been achieved for Fleeming
Jenkin’s movement.
In 1878 was published _Healthy Houses_ (Edin., David Douglas), being the
substance of the two lectures already mentioned as having been delivered
in Edinburgh with the intention of laying open the idea of the scheme
then in contemplation, with a third addressed to the Medico-Chirurgical
Society. This book has been long out of print, and such has been the
demand for it that the American edition {300} is understood to be also
out of print, and unobtainable.
In 1880 was printed (London, Spottiswoode & Co.) a pamphlet entitled
_What is the Best Mode of Amending the Present Laws with Reference to
Existing Buildings_, _and also of Improving their Sanitary Condition with
due Regard to Economical Considerations_?—the substance of a paper read
by Professor Jenkin at the Congress of the Social Science Association at
Edinburgh in October of that year.
The first item of _Health Lectures for the People_ (Edin., 1881) consists
of a discourse on the ‘Care of the Body’ delivered by Professor Jenkin in
the Watt Institution at Edinburgh, in which the theories of house
sanitation are dwelt on.
_House Inspection_, reprinted from the _Sanitary Record_, was issued in
pamphlet form in 1882. And another small tract, _Houses of the Poor_;
_their Sanitary Arrangement_, in 1885.
In this connection it may be said that while the idea formulated by
Jenkin has been carried out with a measure of success that could hardly
have been foreseen, in one point only, it may be noted, has expectation
been somewhat disappointed as regards the good that these Associations
should have effected—and the fact was constantly deplored by the
founder—namely, the comparative failure as a means of improving the
condition of the dwellings of the poorer classes. It was ‘hoped that
charity and public spirit would have used the Association to obtain
reports on poor tenements, and to remedy the most glaring evils.’ {301}
The good that these associations have effected is not to be estimated by
the numbers of their membership. They have educated the public on
certain points. The fact that they exist has become generally known,
and, by consequence, persons of all classes are induced to satisfy
themselves of the reasons for the existence of such institutions, and
thus they learn of the evils that have called them into being.
Builders, burgh engineers, and private individuals in any way connected
with the construction of dwellings in town or country have been put upon
their mettle, and constrained to keep themselves abreast with the
wholesome truths which the engineering staff of all these Sanitary
Associations are the means of disseminating.
In this way, doubtless, some good may indirectly have been done to poorer
tenements, though not exactly in the manner contemplated by the founder.
Now, if it be true that Providence helps those who help themselves,
surely a debt of gratitude is due to him who has placed (as has been
attempted to be shown in this brief narrative) the means of self-help and
the attainment of a palpable benefit within the reach of all through the
working of a simple plan, whose motto well may be, ‘Healthy Houses’; and
device a strangled snake.
A. F.
FOOTNOTES
{113} _Reminiscences of My Later Life_, by Mary Howitt, _Good Words_,
May 1886.
{288} See paper read at the Congress of the Social Science Association,
Edinburgh, October 8, 1880.
{290} It was ultimately agreed not to appoint an officer of this kind
till occasion should arise for his services; none has been appointed.
{295} Briefly stated, the points submitted in this prospectus were
these:
1. That the proposed Association was a Society for the benefit of its
members and the community that cannot be used for any purposes of profit.
2. The privileges of members include the annual inspection of their
premises, as well as a preliminary report on their condition with an
estimate of the cost of any alterations recommended.
3. The skilled inspection from time to time of drains and all sanitary
arrangements.
4. No obligation on the part of members to carry out any of the
suggestions made by the engineers of the Association, who merely give
skilled advice when such is desired.
5. The officers of the Association to have no interest in any outlay
recommended.
6. The Association might be of great service to the poorer members of
the community.
{299} _Healthy Houses_, by Professor Fleeming Jenkin, p. 54.
{300} It is perhaps worth mentioning as a curiosity of literature that
the American publishers who produced this book in the States, without
consulting the author, afterwards sent him a handsome cheque, of course
unsolicited by him.
{301} It is true, handsome tenements for working people have been built,
such as the picturesque group of houses erected with this object by a
member of the Council of the Edinburgh Sanitary Association, at Bell’s
Mills, so well seen from the Dean Bridge, where every appliance that
science can suggest has been made use of. But for the ordinary houses of
the poor the advice of the Association’s engineers has been but rarely
taken advantage of.