British Association. 229 



taic currents. He also referred to other experiments, in which two 

 different varieties of copper ore, witii water taken from the same 

 mine, as the only exciting fluid, produced considerable voltaic 

 action. The various kinds of saline matter which he had detected 

 in water taken from different mines, and from different parts of the 

 same mine, seemed to indicate another probable source of electri- 

 city ; for, can it noxn be doubted, that rocks impregnated with or 

 holding in their minute fissures different kinds of mineral waters, 

 must be in different electrical conditions or relations to each other? 

 A general conclusion is, that in these fissures metalliferous deposits 

 will be determined according to their relative electrical conditions; 

 and that the direction of those deposits must have been influenced 

 by the direction of the magnetic meridian. Thus we find the me- 

 tallic deposits in most parts of the world having a general tendency 

 to an E. and W. or a N.E. and S.W. bearing. .Mr. Fox added, 

 that it was a curious fact, that on submitting the muriate of tin in 

 solution to voltaic action, to the negative pole of the battery, and 

 another to the positive, a portion of the tin was determined like the 

 copper, the former in a metallic state, and the latter in that of an 

 oxide, showing a remarkable analogy to the relative position of tin 

 and copper ore with respect to each other as they are found in the 

 mineral veins. 



The Chairman (Dr. Buckland) said, it had been observed to them 

 last evening, that the tests of some of the highest truths which phi- 

 losophy had brought to light was their simplicity. He held in his 

 hand a' blacking-pot, which Mr. Fox had bought yesterday for a 

 penny, a little water, clay, zinc, and copper ; by which humble means 

 he had imitated one of the most secret and wonderful processes of 

 nature, her mode of making metallic veins. It was with peculiar 

 • satisfaction he contemplated the valuable results of this meeting of 

 the Association. There was also a gentleman now at his right hand, 

 whose name he had never heard till yesterday, a man unconnected 

 with any Society, but possessing the true spirit of a philosopher; 

 this gentleman had actually made no less than 2^ minerals, and even 

 crystalline quartz. He (Dr. B.) knew not how he had made them, 

 but he pronounced them to be discoveries of thehighest order : they 

 were not made with a blacking-pot and clay, like Mr, Fox's, but the 

 apparatus was equally humble ; a bucket of water and a brickbat 

 had sufficed to produce the wonderful effects which he would detail 

 to them. 



Artijicial Crystals and Minerals. — A. Crosse, Esq., of Broomfield, 

 Somerset, then came forward, and stated that he came to Bristol to 

 be a listener only, and with no idea that he should be called upon to 

 address a Section. He was no geologist, and but little of a minera- 

 logist; he had however devoted much of hi slime to electricity, 

 and he had latterly been occupied in improvements in the voltaic 

 power, employing a battery which he had succeeded in keeping in 

 full force for twelve months by water alone, rejecting acids entirely. 

 Mr. C. then proceeded to state that he had obtained water from a 

 finely crystallized cave at Holway, and by the action of the voltaic 

 battery had succeeded in producing from that water in the course of 



