Roscoe’s position in the educational world, and in scientific circles, coupled with his well-known business capacity and sound judgment, frequently led to his being invited to place his knowledge and experience at the service of the State in connection with Royal Commissions and Departmental Committees. During his tenure of his professorship at Manchester he served on two important Royal Commissions; the first in 1876, when Mr. Cross, then Home Secretary, nominated him as a member of Lord Aberdare’s Commission on Noxious Vapours, which led to the amended Alkali Acts of 1891 and 1892; the second in 1881, when Mr. A. J. Mundella, then Vice-President of the Education Council, appointed him a member of Sir Bernhard Samuelson’s Commission on Technical Instruction—one of the most important Commissions ever issued by reason of its influence on the industrial history of this country. Roscoe threw himself heart and soul into its work. The task was thoroughly congenial to him, for he was profoundly convinced of its importance. It required long and frequent visits abroad in order to inquire into the methods of the continental trade-schools and polytechnics, and to judge by direct observation of their results. The preparation of the Report was a tedious and complicated business, but with the help of his colleagues, whom he invited to his holiday-home in the Lakes, it was gradually, as he says, “licked into shape,” the last touches to its recommendations being made at the Chairman’s country house in Devonshire. During the ten years that followed the publication of the Report, Roscoe, in common with several of his colleagues, addressed innumerable public meetings throughout the country in order to make its lessons as widely known as possible. The work of the Commission bore fruit in the Technical Instruction Act of 1889, and still later and to a greater extent in the Education Act of 1902. This last measure was preceded by the Royal Commission on Secondary Education, of which Roscoe was a member under the chairmanship of the present Lord Bryce. In 1896 he introduced a strong and representative deputation to urge upon the Lord President of the Council the desirability of taking steps to enforce its recommendations. It was then intimated that it was the intention of the Government to introduce legislation dealing with the organization of our secondary schools—thus foreshadowing the Act of 1902. Although more than thirty years have passed since the Report of the Technical Instruction Commission was issued, it may still be read with profit. Indeed, the lessons it teaches are singularly applicable to the present juncture. In spite of what has been accomplished, Roscoe was far from being satisfied with our national position. In 1906 he wrote: