Some of the eminent men who have preceded me in this chair have made
their inaugural address the occasion for a forecast of the
improvements in practice and the developments in area of the great
industry in which we are engaged. Several of these forecasts have been
verified by the results; in other cases they have proved to be
mistaken; nor need this excite surprise. I believe that few would have
predicted, when the consideration of the subject was somewhat
unfortunately deferred through want of time at our Paris meeting of
1878, that the basic process would so speedily prove itself to be of
such paramount value as we now know it to possess. On the other hand,
the extinction of the old puddling process has long been the favorite
topic of one of our most practical ex-presidents, and I have shown you
by figures that the process is not only not yet dead, but that the
manufacture of wrought iron is actually flourishing side by side with
that of its younger brother, steel. How much longer this may continue
to be the case it would not be easy to foretell, but there can be
little doubt that, just as for rails steel has superseded iron as
being cheaper and vastly more durable, so it will be in regard to
plates for constructive purposes, and especially for shipbuilding. It
is now an ascertained fact that steel ships are as cheap, ton for ton
of carrying capacity, as iron ones, and it is probable that as the
demand for, and consequently the production of, steel plates
increases, steel ships will become cheaper than those built of iron;
but, what is more important, they have been proved to be safer, and no
time can long elapse before this will tell on the premiums of
insurance. Steel forgings also are superseding, and must to an
increasing extent, supersede iron; while it is probable that the
former will in their turn be replaced for many purposes by the
beautiful solid steel castings which are now being produced by the
Terre-Noire Company in France, the Steel Company of Scotland, and
other manufacturers, by the Siemens-Martin process. On this subject I
believe Mr. Parker can give us valuable information; and on a cognate
branch, namely, the production of steel castings from the Bessemer
converter, an interesting paper will be submitted to us by Mr. Allen
at our present meeting.
I may here mention incidentally, that I have of late had occasion to
make trials on a considerable scale of edge tools made from Bessemer
steel, which show that, except perhaps in the case of the finest
cutlery, there is no longer any occasion to resort to the crucible for
the production of this quality of steel.