196 C. H. Matteucci's Researches relative to the Torpedo^ 



Human perseverance has achieved wonders ; and as the 

 subject engrosses considerable attention just uovf, and v^^e 

 rejoice to find by the periodicals that the Emperor of Russia 

 has placed at the disposal of M. Jacobi and a scientific com- 

 mittee 500/. for the purpose of making experiments, we may 

 indulge in the hope that before long some successful results 

 will be the fruits of their labours, and that a new method of 

 employing magnetism will be discovered ; for from the present 

 mode, if my notions be correct, we have little to hope for on a 

 large scale, and playdiings are not worth the mechanician's 

 notice. I remain, Gentlemen, yours, &c., 



Francis Watkins. 



XXVIII. Physical, Chemical, and Physiological Researches re- 

 lative to the Torpedo ; and some Remarks on the Contractions 

 of the Frog, By C. H. Matteucci {read before the Prench 

 Academy by M. Becquerel)*. 



IVf MATTEUCCI has presented to the Academy a Me- 

 -'-*-*■• moir on the electrical phaenomena of the torpedo, as 

 also several notes relative to the contractions produced in the 

 frog by the contact of the muscles with the nerves. These 

 having been submitted to the examination of a committee 

 composed of MM. Breschet and Pouillet and of myself, we 

 have the honour of laying before you an account of these va- 

 rious researches. 



The sensation which the torpedo causes when it is touched 

 has long ago attracted the attention of physicists and physio- 

 logists, on account of its analogy with that produced by an 

 electrical battery, but it is only a few years since that it has 

 been decidedly proved that both were owing to the same cause. 

 Although all the principal circumstances of this phaenomenon 

 had previously been carefully studied, yet no one had succeeded 

 in demonstrating its electrical origin from the want of suitable 

 apparatus. 



John Davy made known in a paper published in 1832 a 

 great number of important data, such as the action of the dis- 

 charge upon the magnet needle, and the chemical compounds; 

 but the direction of the electrical current produced on this 

 occasion was not well known until after the experiments made 

 at Venice, 1835, by two of your members, and from which it 

 resulted that the superior part of the electrical organ gives 

 positive electricity, and the inferior part negative electricity. 

 Matteucci has confirmed with the galvanometer and frogs 



* Translated by Mr. Francis from the Comptes Kendus, No, S3, Dec. 1837. 



