ELECTRICITY. 



491 



Inscriptive 



F.lectridtv. 



Ascending 



thunder- 



holt. 



Singular 

 electrical 

 phenomena 

 obscrvi-il on 

 Mont Bre- 

 vcn, 1167. 



with a hole three inches in diameter, the staves were 

 broken, and in spite of the iron hoops which retained 

 them, they were dashed with violence against the walls. 

 In 17-.J, M. Seguier of'Nismes, when he was at a coun- 

 try house about a league from the town, observed du- 

 ring a thunder storm the lightning rise from a field in 

 the form of a flame about 6' feet wide. This phenome- 

 non soon disappeared, and was followed by a loud clap 

 of thunder. Similar phenomena have been noticed and 

 described by many distinguished philosophers, so that 

 there can be no doubt that lightning often rises both 

 from the surface of the earth and from the sur- 

 face of water in the time of thunder storms. The 

 Abbe Bertholon has collected, with great care, numerous 

 examples of this phenomenon, but we can only find 

 room for the references to the works in which they are 

 contained. 



The Marquis MafFei and several other authors have 

 concluded from the preceding facts, that lightning has 

 its origin in the earth, and always ascends into the at- 

 mosphere. This conclusion, however, is obviously too 

 general, and is directly opposed by farts more nume- 

 rous than those which are brought to support it. 



Having thus described the general phenomena which 

 accompany a storm of thunder and lightning, we shall 

 conclude this Section by an account of some electrical 

 appearances, of a very singular character, which have 

 been observed by individuals when overtaken by thun- 

 der storms on the tops of lofty mountains. 



In the year 1 767, M. de Saussure, M. Pictet, and M. 

 Jalabert ascended to Mont Breven, which is situated 

 nearly in the middle of the valley of Chamouni, and almost 

 exactly opposite to Mont Blanc. Their object was to 

 take a general view of the form and position of the gla- 

 ciers which descend from this celebrated mountain. When 

 they reached the summit, M. Jalabert began to take a 

 drawing of the glaciers, M. Pictet was engaged in the 

 geographical part, and M. de Siiussure was preparing to 

 make his experiments on natural and artificial electrici- 

 ty. When M. Pictet was laying down upon hisplun some 

 particular mountains by means of a graphometer, he had 

 occasion to ask the names of them from the guides, and 

 was therefore obliged to point out the individual moun- 

 tains with his finger. Every time that he raised his 

 hand for that purpose, he felt at the extremity of his 

 finger a kind of tremulous and prickly sensation, simi- 

 lar to that which is experienced upon presenting the 

 finger to a globe of glass highly electrified. M. Pictet 

 soon perceived the origin of this phenomenon. He ob- 

 served a stormy cloud in the middle region of Mont 

 Blanc, directly opposite to Mont Breven, and it in- 

 stantly occurred to him that he had been affected with 

 the electricity of the cloud. He then requested M. 

 de Saussure and Jalabert to repeat the experiment, 

 and as soon as they extended their hands, they ex- 

 perienced the same sensation, which they described 

 as resembling a number of small electric sparks; 

 but fearing that they might be seduced by their imagi- 

 nation, they made their guides and their servants 

 stretch out their hand, and they felt the same sensa- 

 tion. The electricity of the atmosphere having now 

 begun to increase, the sensation became stronger, and 

 was even accompanied with a kind of whistling noise. 

 M. Jalabert, who had a gold band upon his hat, was 

 alarmed with a buzzing noise about his head, and ha- 

 ving taken off his hat, and put it successively upon the 

 heads of Pictet and Saussure, they heard distinctly the 

 same sound, and even obtained sparks from the golden 

 button of the hat. The thunder cloud had now moved 





across the valley, and was directly above their heads. Dercriptive 

 The thunder was loud, and the flashes of lightning so Electricity. 

 frequent, that the travellers found it prudent to descend " """V" 

 about 20 or 30 yards, where no electricity could be 

 perceived. The guides, however, were so much de- 

 lighted with the experiments, that it was with great 

 difficulty they were persuaded to abandon such a dan- 

 gerous amusement. A shower of rain soon afterwards 

 fell, and the storm ceased. The travellers reascended 

 to the summit, and although they elevated an electri- 

 cal kite, they were unable to perceive any indications 

 of electricity in the atmosphere. 



A series of electrical phenomena, very similar to similar 

 those which we have now described, were recently ob- phenomena 

 served by a party of Englishmen, when they were de- observed on 



scending" Mount ./Etna, during a storm of thunder and 

 i- i i ? i ? n 



lightning. I have been indebted tor the particulars ot 



the following account of them to my friend Dr Gor- 

 don, to whom it was communicated through the medi- 

 um of a letter to Dr Moncrieff, by Mr Gillies, surgeon 

 to his majesty's ship Partridge. This gentleman not 

 only read a detail of the phenomena in a Sicilian 

 journal, entitled Spccchio delict scienxa e Giornalc - 

 cyclopedica de Sicilia, which was published in July 1814, 

 but received an account of them from Mr Tapper, one of 

 the party, coinciding in every respect with that which 

 was given in the Sicilian Journal. On the 2d of June 

 1814, Mr Tupper and Mr Lanfiar, accompanied by a 

 guide, ascended Mount JEtna. During tlieir descent, 

 when they were at a little distance from the place called 

 the English House in the rcgio dcserla,'they were over- 

 taken with a storm of thunder and lightning, accom- 

 panied with a heavy fall of snow ; and while running 

 over an extensive field of snow, they were struck by a 

 flash of lightning, from which, however, they expe- 

 rienced no serious injury. Mr Tup]ier felt a painful 

 sensation in his back, which gradually ascended to- 

 wards his head, and occasioned a sensation as if his 

 hair was moving, an effect exactly similar to that which 

 is produced either when a person is electrified upon 

 an insulated Mip|K>rt, or when his head is presented to the 

 prime conductor of an electrifying machine. This sensa- 

 tion induced Mr Tupper to raise his hand to his head, 

 upon which he was surprised to hear a buzzing noise 

 proceeding from his finger. Upon raising and extend- 

 ing his arm the noise still continued, but upon moving 

 his hand and fingers in different directions, and with 

 different degrees of velocity, he found that he could 

 produce, at pleasure, a great variety of musical sounds, 

 differing in their tone as well as in their intensity, 

 and so loud that they could be distinctly heard at the 

 distance of 40 tieet. The Sicilian guide witnessed these 

 phenomena with extreme dismay, and imagining that 

 Mr Tupper produced the sounds in virtue of some su- 

 pernatural power, he immediately began to cross him- 

 self, and invoke the protection of his saint. His 

 alarm, however, speedily subsided, when, upon being 

 desired to elevate his own arm, he found it as musical 

 as that of Mr Tupper. Mr Lanfiar, who was a little be- 

 hind the rest of the party, now joined them, and found 

 that his fingers possessed a similar property. In the. 

 course of five minutes, reckoning, we presume, from 

 the arrival of Mr Lanfiar, their fingers lost their acous- 

 tic property, the cloud having by this time passed to a 

 considerable distance. Mr Tupper had received an in- 

 jury in his left shoulder joint by a fall from his horse, 

 but he never afterwards experienced any return of the 

 pain after the copious electrisation which he received 

 upon Mount JEtna. 



