316 Prof. Fleming on Electro-magnetic Bepulsion. [March 6, 



of the rest I desire to record my obligations and thanks. Illus- 

 trative as these experiments are of important facts in connection 

 with the use of alternating currents, they have a special value at 

 the present time. In the opening year of next century, when we 

 celebrate the centenary of the first practical production by Volta, 

 in 1801, of the electric current, we shall find ourselves in the presence 

 of the fact that almost every large city is ramified by a subterranean 

 network of copper conductors for the distribution of electric energy 

 as a necessary of modern life ; and although it may be dangerous 

 to express too confident a view on the direction which the progress 

 of electrical invention may take, yet it does not seem improbable that 

 the alternating current will be doing a considerable share of that 

 work. It is, therefore, not only as a contribution to a comprehension 

 of the vagaries of these alternating currents that the phenomena we 

 have shortly studied are worthy of attention, but also as being, 

 perhaps, the avenue of approach to a further possession of valuable 

 knowledge, enlarging our view^s, and capable, without doubt, of being 

 minted into the current coin of useful an5 ingenious applications.* 



[J. A. F.] 



* For the loan of the blocks, illustrating the foregoing reprint, the author is 

 indebted to the#Editor of the Electrician. 



