in reply to the Rev. Prof. Ritchie. 13 



•as yet in its infancy; looking to facts therefore, I hope before 

 long to have an opportunity of convincing Dr. Ritchie of the 

 correctness of my results as already stated. I cannot well 

 collect from his details of the second experiment, that Dr. 

 Ritchie magnetized the connecting arc as well as the bars : for 

 he says, " cut a bar into three portions ; bend one into an arc, 

 and magnetize the two parts." If he left, as I assume, the third 

 part, or the arc, unmagnetized, it will be quite apparent that the 

 unmagnetic arc will not give the power described by me: 

 hence his error. The arc and the bars should be magnetized 

 to saturation, and applied as I have before stated, namely, one 

 to the opposing poles of the front bars, the other to those of 

 the hack\ for if placed upon the intervening bars while the 

 first-named are unconnected^ the effect is not nearly so great. 



Dr. Ritchie again mistakes me, when he understands me 

 to assume, that connecting- pieces less than the dimensions 

 given, would produce the same increase of power; my re- 

 marks were made in relation to the size of the arcs described, 

 as compared with larger ones, and went to show that there was 

 a limit to the increase of power, in as much as augmented power 

 did not accompany enlargement of the arcs, and this is the 

 fact; but it does not at all follow, that because this is the case, 

 smaller arcs than those described would prove as efficacious ; 

 for it is easy to conceive that the arcs should contain a certain 

 amount of aggregated particles magnetically combined with 

 the electric element, in order to produce the maximum in- 

 crease of power in the bars ; but that beyond that amount no 

 increase of the particles could augment the power obtained, 

 without a proportional augmentation of the bars, or more 

 strictly of the magneto-electrized particles of the bars. 



I am quite free to acknowledge that I did not express my- 

 self upon this point in terms as precise as I could wish, but a 

 little consideration would, lam certain, have shown Dr. Ritchie 

 that I merely meant to signify that sis^e beyond a certain limit 

 previously defined, did not augment the fower jptoduced. 



As I mean to write more in detail upon these matters as 

 soon as I shall have obtained the results of a course of ex- 

 periments in which I have been for some time engaged, I 

 will not go further into this interesting subject at present. 



Beaufort-House, Nov. 4, 1836. Fred. W. Mullins. 



