49<> Conccfning the revolving DoubUr of EkBrickf, 



it — if you thought it improper, you ought to have mentioned it at a proper time, viz. when 

 you returned the manufcript, or before it was fent to the prefs ; and your requeft would have 

 been .literally complied with. With regard to the inftrument itfelf, it is at prefent ufelefs; 

 and it is allowed by all, that it has totally failed for want of a perfedl infulation. If this de- 

 fe£i: fhould at fome future time be overcome, the doubler of ele£lricity, will then be tlie moft 

 ufeful and the moft noble inftrument in the whole group of electric apparatus. 



I remain, fir, 



Your very humble fervant, 



JOHN READ. 



^aJrant, in Knight/bridge , 

 January i "jth, 1 799. 



"Though the above letter relates to perfonal incidents, which may not, perhaps, be confidered 

 with any great degree of intereft, yet I conceive my readers will admit the propriety of publifli- 

 ing it, in order that Mr. Read, whofe candour, as an author, has been called in queftion, may 

 juftify himfelf to that public, which he has eflentially ferved during a long life, employed as an 

 inftrument-maker and operative philofopher. I am well content, that the declfion refpedting 

 the doubler, Ihould be made by the tribunal to which he refers, and to which it of right 

 belongs. If a careful review of what I have written, together with his prefent communica- 

 tion, had led me to alter my fentiments, it would be my duty to fay fo in this place. But I 

 think I have faithfully ftated the fafts in the paflage he alludes to, and have only to remark, 

 that the indireft mention of my name, in page 29 of his work, was little, if at all, 

 calculated to deftroy the conclufion which his readers would obvioufly be induced to 

 make, from the unacknowledged copy in the former part of the chapter; in proof of which, 

 the inference of the foreign philofophers, who were mifled in his favour as the inventor, is 

 nearly decifive. His narrative refpe£ting my having pofleffed his manufcript, previous to 

 its publication, is not quite correal in the manner, becaufe it does not communicate the 

 whole of what happened. Either Dr. Prieftley, or elfe Mr. Read with the Doftor's recom- 

 mendation, did deliver to me certain manufcripts about fix or feren years ago, which I believe 

 to have been part, or the whole, of what was fince publiftied, under tlie title of A Summary 

 Vienv, i^c. but they were not put into my hands with the notion that any relation might 

 fubfift between me and their contents, which could require the full powers Mr. Read men- 

 tions •, — but fimply to corre£t and prepare them for the prefs, on condition of being paid 

 for my labour. As I have always declined this kind of employ, excepting when motives of 

 perfonal acquaintance or friendlhip have led me to it, I returned tliis copy untouched, and 

 unperufed, to the author, and fuppofed of courfe, that he had employed fome other perfon to 

 revife it. I hope and believe, therefore, that notwithftanding this incident, upon which Mr. 

 Read feems to place fo much reliance, it cannot be tliought to afford any ground for an infi- 

 xiuation, that I have been induced to fpeak as I have done, of his fliare in the invention of the 

 doubler, from any motives, but fuch as ought to guide an independent narrator of philofophi- 

 cal fads. 



With 



