child, also dying at the same place.
It would be difficult to find a more remarkable family in any age or
country. Soon after the birth of William, Mr. Siemens removed to a
larger estate which he had leased at Menzendorf, near Lubeck.

As a child William was sensitive and affectionate, the baby of the
family, liking to roam the woods and fields by himself, and curious to
observe, but not otherwise giving any signs of the engineer. He received
his education at a commercial academy in Lubeck, the Industrial School
at Magdeburg (city of the memorable burgomaster, Otto von Guericke), and
at the University of Gottingen, which he entered in 1841, while in his
eighteenth year. Were he attended the chemical lectures of Woehler, the
discoverer of organic synthesis, and of Professor Himly, the well-known
physicist, who was married to Siemens's eldest sister, Mathilde. With
a year at Gottingen, during which he laid the basis of his theoretical
knowledge, the academical training of Siemens came to an end, and he
entered practical life in the engineering works of Count Stolberg, at
Magdeburg. At the University he had been instructed in mechanical
laws and designs; here he learned the nature and use of tools and the
construction of machines. But as his University career at Gottingen
lasted only about a year, so did his apprenticeship at the Stolberg
Works. In this short time, however, he probably reaped as much advantage
as a duller pupil during a far longer term.

Young Siemens appears to have been determined to push his way
forward. In 1841 his brother Werner obtained a patent in Prussia for
electro-silvering and gilding; and in 1843 Charles William came to
England to try and introduce the process here. In his address on
'Science and Industry,' delivered before the Birmingham and Midland
Institute in 1881, while the Paris Electrical Exhibition was running,
Sir William gave a most interesting account of his experiences during
that first visit to the country of his adoption.

'When,' said he, 'the electrotype process first became known, it excited
a very general interest; and although I was only a young student at
Gottingen, under twenty years of age, who had just entered upon his
practical career with a mechanical engineer, I joined my brother, Werner
Siemens, then a young lieutenant of artillery in the Prussian service,
in his endeavours to accomplish electro-gilding; the first impulse
in this direction having been given by Profe