AERONAUTICAL ENGINEERING.

The suggestion to teach aeronautical theory in our universities is strongly to the point. Lieut, Sir Arthur Brown of the Royal Air Force, responsible for this piece of good counsel, must have noticed the pitifully small scale of our flying service, compared with that of England. Perhaps our slow progress at present deserves excuse, because other far reaching problems confront the Government in the form of labor questions. But in the near future we are likely to see the formation by Congress of a special Department of Aeronautics. A bill to that effect is before the Senate now. The new department will initiate the first upward push of our tardy development.

The Government will then seek new men to overtake England in the progress of flying. Their will be no scarcity of pilots; thousands will learn to loop and dive if given the chance. But places for good aeronautical engineers will be more difficult to fill. Until the demand for them is satisfied. America cannot lead in aviation.

Were students in engineering schools like our own able to take theoretical courses in aviation, a wide field for activity would open to them upon graduation; and a progressive Air Force worthy of our industrial magnitude would represent the nation.