Dr. Bowditch, President of the American Academy. hii 
On either hypothesis it becomes essential to ascertain the laws 
of light. La Place, as before observed, pursues his investigation of 
the laws of reflection and refraction upon the Mewtonian theory ; 
and Dr. Bowditch, in an able and copious Note, shows how the 
same results may be obtained according to the wave theory. 
But of the numberless topics of interest and importance discussed 
in this great work, none is more singularly curious than one, whose 
name will hardly convey a just idea of the subject itself, —I mean 
that of Capillary Aitraction, which La Place himself pronounces 
to be “one of the most curious objects of Physics.” * This is a 
part of the work, on which our late President has concentrated his 
powers of analysis with as much force and skill, as upon any of the 
numerous subjects which he has examined in his Commentary. 
In order that the importance of this subject may be understood, 
and that a just view may be taken of the extent of it in its various 
relations, we must reflect for a moment upon some of the numerous 
modes, in which this species of attraction exhibits itself. 
The most usual form, in which it has been the subject of observa- 
tion and experiment, is, in the ascent of water, or any other fluid, 
in capillary tubes, or between two plates of glass placed near each 
other in a vessel containing the fluid. The same principle, however, 
governs the movements of fluids in numberless other cases; some 
of which are so familiar to us, that they cease to attract our notice. 
For example; when we fill a glass or other vessel with water, if the 
vessel is already wet, the water will be drawn upwards round the 
sides of the vessel, and present a concave surface ; but if, on the 
contrary, the vessel is entirely dry, the water will rise in it with a 
convex surface, and may, in popular language, be heaped up even 
above the brim of the vessel. From the same cause, a light body 
* Bowditch’s La Place, Vol. IV. p. 694. 
