126 Dr. Hare’s improved Deflagrator. [Avue. 
support, prove that the calorific influence is greatly and pecu- 
larly predominant.” 
With regard to light, Dr. H. observes, “I fear that in my essays 
on galvanic theory, the possible activity oflight has beentoo much 
overlooked. The corpuscular changes which have been traced to 
‘the distinctive energies of this principle are so few that we have 
all been in the habit, erroneously perhaps, of viewing it as an 
inert product in those changes effected by caloric, electricity, 
and chemical action, which it most strikingly characterizes. 
Yet reflecting on the prodigious intensity in which it has been 
extricated by the deflagrator, it seems wrong not to suspect it 
of being an effective constituent of the galvanic stream. Possi- 
bly its presence in varying proportions may be one reason of the 
incompatibility of the voltaic current as generated under differ- 
ent circumstances, or by various forms of apparatus. It may 
also suggest, why in addition to changes in the force or nature 
of the sensation produced by the galvanic discharges which may 
be considered as dependent on electric intensity, peculiarities 
have been observed which are not to be thus explained. The 
effect on the animal frame has been alleged to be proportional 
to the electrical intensity, the effect on metals to the quantity; 
but according to the observations of Singer (which are confirmed 
by mine), the electrical intensity is as great with water as with 
acid, if not greater even than with the latter. The reverse is 
true of the shock. When the plates of the deflagrator are 
moistened and withdrawn from the acid, the shock is far less 
owerful; yet the electrical excitement appears stronger. Light 
is undeniably requisite to vegetable life; perhaps it is no less 
necessary in the more complicated process of animal vitality, 
and the electric fluid may be the mean of its distribution. The 
miraculous difference observed in the properties of organic pro- 
ducts, formed of the same ponderable elements, may be due to 
imponderable agents conveyed and fixed in them by galvanism. 
Hence it may arise that the prussic acid instantaneously kills 
when applied to a tongue containing the same ponderable ele- 
ments. When by the intense decomposition of matter light is 
always evolved ; when an atom of tallow gives out enough of it 
to produce sensation in the retina of millions of living beings, 
why may it not, when presented in due form, influence the taste, 
and otherwise stimulate the nervous system? For such an office 
its subtilty would seem to qualify it eminently. The phenomena 
of the fire-fly and the glow-worm prove that it may be secreted 
“by the process of vitality. 
“« The discovery of alkaline qualities, as well as acid, in orga- 
nic products whose elements are otherwise found, whether 
separate or in combination, without any such qualities, and the 
opposite habitudes of acids and alkalies with the voltaic poles, 
and their power of combining with, and neutralizing each other, 
indicate that there may be something adventitious which causes 
