PART VI.
Prior to 1771, engineers who did not know each other very well often met accidentally in the Houses of Parliament and in the Courts of Justice, and frequently each stoutly maintained the superiority of his own opinions; and heated technical arguments were put forward for non-technical politicians to adjudicate upon. It was suggested to Smeaton that such a state of the profession was undesirable, and that it would be well if occasional meetings could be arranged where Civil Engineers might shake hands, and become personally acquainted, so that in this way, and by a friendly interchange of opinions on controversial subjects, and by a comparison of experiences, it might be possible to eliminate erroneous ideas and conduct their business “without jostling one another with rudeness, too common in the unworthy part of the advocates of the law, whose interest it might be to push them on, perhaps too far, in discussing points in contest.”
E. Fiander Etchells