Shut off from the world and completely out of touch with fellow-laborers perhaps only a few miles away, the investigators were naturally seriously handicapped; and inventions and discoveries were not made with the same rapidity that they would undoubtedly have been had the same men been receiving daily, weekly, or monthly communications from fellow-laborers all over the world, as they do to-day.

Neither did they have the advantage of public or semi-public laboratories, where they were brought into contact with other men, from whom to gather fresh trains of thought and receive the stimulus of their successes or failures.

In the natural course of events, however, neighbors who were interested in somewhat similar pursuits, not of the character of the rivalry of trade or commerce, would meet more or less frequently and discuss their progress.

The mutual advantages of such intercourse would be at once appreciated; and it would be but a short step from the casual meeting of two neighborly scientists to the establishment of "societies," meeting at fixed times, and composed of members living within reasonable travelling distance.

There would, perhaps, be the weekly or monthly meetings of men in a limited area; and as the natural outgrowth of these little local societies, with frequent meetings, would come the formation of larger societies, meeting less often, where members travelled a considerable distance to attend.