Eloge of Alexander Volla. IS 



Since flame subtracts electricity from the air much more rea- 

 dily than pointed metallic rods, does it not follow, said VoJta, 

 that the best means of preventing storms, or diminishing their 

 destructive eflects, is to kindle large fires in the fields, or, what 

 is still better, on elevated situations ? After reflecting on the 

 powerful effects of the minute wick attached to the electrometer, 

 it seems no way unreasonable to suppose that a large flame may 

 deprive, in a few moments, great bodies of air and vapour, of all 

 their electrical fluid. 



Volta was desirous to submit this opinion to the test of direct 

 experiment. Hitherto his wishes have not been carried into ef- 

 fect. Perhaps they would be looked upon in a favourable point 

 of view, if a comparison were instituted between the meteorolo- 

 gical observations made in the counties of England, where great 

 furnaces transform the night and day into oceans of fire, and 

 those of the neighbouring agricultural counties. 



These Jeux paratonnerres caused Volta to lay aside the se- 

 vere gravity of his ordinary manner. He tried to sport with 

 his subject at the expense of some learnedindividuals, who, like 

 the famous Dutens, always perceived, when too late, the discove- 

 ries of their contemporaries in some ancient author. He called 

 upon them, in this case, to go back to the fabulous times of the 

 Greeks and Romans, and directed their attention to the sacrifices 

 under the open sky, to the flames ascending from the altars, and 

 the black columns of smoke rising into the air from the bodies of 

 the victims ; to all the ceremonies in short which the vulgar be- 

 lieved fitted to appease the wrath of the gods, and disarm the ful- 

 minating hand of Jupiter. All these were only a simple expe- 

 riment in physics, of which the priests alone possessed the se- 

 cret, designed to bring silently to the earth the electricity of the 

 air and clouds. The Greeks and Romans, at the most brilliant 

 periods of their history, offered sacrifices, it is true, in covered 

 temples ; but, adds Volta, " this difficulty admits of a reply, 

 since it may be said that Pythagoras, Aristotle, Cicero, Pliny, 

 and Seneca, were only ignorant people, who had not acquired 

 even by tradition, the scientific knowledge of their ancestors !"^ 



No criticism could be more eff*ective ; but in order to expect 

 some good result from it, it is necessary to forget, that in seek- 

 ing in old books for the rudiments of great discoveries, the Zoili 



