652 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



jects " for dissection, their bodies were sent to Windmill Street, and 

 the popular notion was that, being old and faithful servants of the 

 doctors, they were galvanized to life, and again set up in their old 

 business. 



It is amusing to read some of the treatises on medical galvanism 

 that were published at about this period, and contrast their positive 

 statements of cures effected and results anticipated with the position 

 now attained by electricity as a curative agent. Then came the brill- 

 iant discoveries of Faraday, Ampere, etc., demonstrating the relations 

 between electricity and magnetism, and immediately following them 

 a multitude of patents for electro-motors, and wild dreams of super- 

 seding steam-engines by magneto-electric machinery. 



The following, which I copy from " The Penny Mechanic," of 

 June 10, 1837, is curious, and very instructive to those who think of 

 investing in any of the electric-power companies of to-day : " Mr. 

 Thomas Davenport, a Vermont blacksmith, has discovered a mode of 

 applying magnetic and electro-magnetic power, which we have good 

 ground for believing will be of immense importance to the world." 

 This announcement is followed by reference to Professor Silliman's 

 " American Journal of Science and the Arts," for April, 1837, and 

 extracts from American papers, of which the following is a specimen : 

 " 1. We saw a small cylindrical battery, about nine inches in length, 

 three or four in diameter, produce a magnetic power of about three 

 hundred pounds, and which, therefore, we could not move with our 

 utmost strength. 2. We saw a small wheel, five and a half inches in 

 diameter, jDerforming more than six hundred revolutions in a minute, 

 and lift a weight of twenty-four pounds one foot per minute, from the 

 power of a battery of still smaller dimensions. 3. We saw a model 

 of a locomotive-engine traveling on a circular railroad with immense 

 velocity, and rapidly ascending an inclined plane of far greater eleva- 

 tion than any hitherto ascended by steam-power. And these and 

 various other experiments which we saw convinced us of the truth of 

 the opinion expressed by Professors Silliman, Renwick, and others, 

 that the power of machinery may be increased from this source be- 

 yond any assignable limit. It is computed by these learned men that 

 a circular galvanic battery about three feet in diameter, with magnets 

 of a proportionable surface, would produce at least a hundred horse- 

 power ; arid therefore that two such batteries would be sufficient to 

 propel ships of the largest class across the Atlantic. The only mate- 

 rials required to generate and continue this power for such a voyage 

 would be a few thin sheets of copper and zinc, and a few gallons of 

 mineral water." 



The Faure Accumulator is but a very weak affair compared with 

 this, Sir William Thomson notwithstanding. To render the date of 

 the above fully appreciable, I may note that three months later the 

 magazine from which it is quoted was illustrated with a picture of the 



