ELECTRICITY. 61 



portance to all things around us. Though we 

 cannot quite say, with the poet, that the glorious 

 sun 



" plays the alchemist, 



Turning with splendour of his precious eye 

 The meagre cloddy earth to glitt'ring gold ;" 



yet when we look at all the exquisite colours 

 and forms which owe their existence to its 

 beams, we can say that a ray of light fulfils a 

 wonderful part in the chemistry of creation. 

 We shall have occasion, as we proceed, to refer 

 to its varied influences in the different kingdoms 

 whose chemistry we propose to consider. 



Yet the sunshine after all only forms one of 

 several agencies which combine together to give 

 life to, and to preserve the many beauties of 

 our landscape. The earth, the grass, the trees, 

 yon shining river, and those sailing clouds, could 

 they be again interrogated, would disclose to 

 us yet another agent, which influences them all, 

 and is for ever darting from and to them, silently 

 and unseen, assisting in all the phenomena they 

 exhibit, and consequently intimately concerned 

 in the various processes of the chemistry of 

 creation. This agent is electricity. This quick 

 and wonderful principle passes incessantly 

 through the soil on which we tread, influencing 

 in various ways the chemical ingredients it 

 <x)ntains. Every blade of grass is sensible of 



