From Pole to Pole

From Pole to Pole

by George Griffith
From Pole to Pole

From Pole to Pole

by George Griffith

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Overview

"Well, Professor, what is it? Something pretty important, I suppose,
from the wording of your note. What is the latest achievement? Have
you solved the problem of aerial navigation, or got a glimpse into the
realms of the fourth dimension, or what?"

"No, not any of those as yet, my friend, but something that may be
quite as wonderful of its sort," replied Professor Haffkin, putting
his elbows down on the table and looking keenly across it under his
shaggy, iron-grey eyebrows at the young man who was sitting on the
opposite side pulling meditatively at a good cigar and sipping a
whisky-andsoda.

"Well, if it is something really extraordinary and at the same time
practicable--as you know, my ideas of the practicable are fairly
wide--I'm there as far as the financial part goes. As regards the
scientific end of the business, if you say 'Yes,' it is 'Yes.'"

Mr. Arthur Princeps had very good reasons for thus "going blind" on a
project of which he knew nothing save that it probably meant a sort of
scientific gamble to the tune of several thousands of pounds. He had
had the good fortune to sit under the Professor when he was a student
at, the Royal School of Mines, and being possessed of that rarest of
all gifts, an intuitive imagination, he had seen vast possibilities
through the meshes of the verbal network of the Professor's lectures.

Further, the kindly Fates had blessed him with a twofold dowry. He had
a keen and insatiable thirst for that kind of knowledge which is
satisfied only by the demonstration of hard facts. He was a student of
physical science simply because he couldn't help it; and his
grandfather had left him groundrents in London, Birmingham, and
Manchester, and coal and iron mines in half-adozen counties, which
produced an almost preposterous income.

At the same time, he had inherited from his mother and his grandmother
that kind of intellect which enabled him to look upon all this wealth
as merely a means to an end.

Later on, Profeesor Haffkin had been his examiner in Applied
Mathematics at London University, and he had done such an astonishing
paper that he had come to him after he had taken his D.Sc. degree and
asked him in brief but pregnant words for the favour of his personal
acquaintance. This had led to an intellectual intimacy which not only
proved satisfactory from the social and scientific points of view, but
also materialised on many profitable patents.

The Professor was a man rich in ideas, but comparatively poor in
money. Arthur Princeps had both ideas and money, and as a result of
this conjunction of personalities the man of science had made
thousands out of his inventions, while the scientific man of business
had made tens of thousands by exploiting them; and that is how matters
stood between them on this particular evening when they were dining
tete-a-tete in the Professor's house in Russell Square

Product Details

BN ID: 2940013744998
Publisher: WDS Publishing
Publication date: 01/13/2012
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
File size: 29 KB
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