SOURCE OP ST. Peter's river. 189 



as our party had been on very short allowance for some 

 time past, and as a fishing establishment exists at the 

 head of the bay. With this view we continued our jour- 

 ney late, and stopped at a very ineligible situation on the 

 shore, where, there being no means of pitching our flies, 

 we lay exposed all night in a snow storm. The weather, 

 which had become very cold, afforded Mr. Colhoun an o])- 

 portunity of making a curious observation, which he has 

 noted in the following words : — 



" I carry my pocket compass in a fob. When it is taken 

 out, one end of the needle is found adhering to the face of the 

 instrument, which is enamelled like that of a watch. The ad- 

 hesion is not overcome by the approach of steel, but it yields 

 to the weight of the needle, for if it be sufficiently inclined the 

 other end adheres in turn. The duration of this phenomenon 

 varies according to the temperature of the atmosphere ; at 

 the lowest temperature, which we have experienced, the 

 needle was unable to traverse for the space of fifteen minutes, 

 as if the cold rendered the operating principle slow to retire. 

 During the warm weather, I frequently remarked a disturb- 

 ance, but it so quickly subsided, that I was content to attribute 

 it to an accidental agitation of the compass. Electricity, 

 evolved from the body, will be at once looked to, as the 

 cause of this phenomenon, from the connexion long known 

 to exist between it and magnetism. Whether the needle 

 be operated upon immediately, or through the substance of 

 which the face is composed, future observation must deter- 

 mine. Perhaps the Chinese would say that the magnetic 

 virtue is not suspended, but only beneficially modified by 

 some property or concomitant of vital heat, and there ap- 

 pears to be sufficient ground to establish for them a claim 

 to the discovery of its influence, in the last sentence of the 

 following quotation : — 



Vol. II. 25 



