492 Mr. R. Phillips on Elechncity and Steam. 



The wire-gauze being placed in the steam as it issued from 

 the end of the glass tube showed that it was positive. 



44. A glass tube, 3 feet 10 inches long and I'l inch dia- 

 meter, was substituted for the former tube. With this tube 

 all the foregoing effects were observed, but they were more 

 powerful. 



45. These experiments are only exhibitions of frictional 

 electricity ; and the different states of the tube are principally 

 produced by the tube taking its charge, either from the brass 

 jet or from the excited steam that issued from it. 



46. The Armstrong's condenser was now interposed, with 

 water in it, between the boiler and the brass jet ; and the 

 smaller tube (42.) had the end which came to the brass jet 

 fitted with a good cork, through which the brass jet passed and 

 projected into the tube much as before ; the joint was then made 

 tight with caoutchouc and thread. To ascertain the state of 

 the steam, I employed a piece of wire gauze, 6^ inches by 4 

 inches, attached by means of stout wire to an insulating handle, 

 by which the gauze could be held in the steam and then 

 taken to an electrometer. This wire-gauze collector was 

 generally used in the following experiments. 



47. The steam being turned on, the tube and boiler became 

 positive. When the wire-gauze was held at about an inch or 

 two from the end of the tube, it took from the steam a nega- 

 tive charge; and at the distance of something more than a 

 foot, the gauze also acquired a negative charge which affected 

 the single-leaf electrometer; and at intermediate positions the 

 charge was still negative. 



48. When the condenser was removed, and the jet was 

 screwed into the cock of the boiler, everything else being as 

 before (46.), no decided electrical effects were observed ; but 

 when the glass tube was also removed, then, having connected 

 the boiler with the single-leaf electrometer and cautiously 

 turning the cock, it was discovered that at a particular pres- 

 sure the boiler became positive, and at much higher or lower 

 pressures negative. 



49. Now I regard these electrical effects as frictional, and 

 possibly similar to those alternations in the electrical state of 

 the boiler observed by Mr. Armstrong. (Phil. Mag. vol. xxiii. 

 p. 202.) 



50. While the steam was escaping into the air from the 

 brass jet as above, I made some attempts to ascertain whether 

 the steam was positive or negative ; the electricity was very 

 feeble, on which account I did not care much about it, but the 

 little that I obtained was decidedly positive. This may have 

 arisen, although it is improbable, from the boiler becoming 



