112 DAVY. 



denied by Yolta, the author of the pile, and indeed of 

 the science which, like the continent of America, has 

 borne the name of another than the discoverer. This 

 had seemed probable from the presence being indis- 

 pensable of a liquid capable of decomposing one or 

 other of the metals, both supposed to be equally ne- 

 cessary to the production of the electric stream. 

 Davy's experiments, which were numerous and admir- 

 ably devised, and most laboriously conducted, now 

 showed that the presence of two metals was not re- 

 quired to provide the electricity. One metal, and one 

 other substance separated from it, with a fluid acting 

 upon either the metal or the substance ; or a metal 

 separating two fluids, one of which acts upon it ; nay, 

 one metal exposed to the same fluid, but acted upon 

 differently on its different sides or surfaces by the 

 fluid's strength differing on the different sides ; or one 

 and the same metal in different pieces plunged into 

 the same fluid, at an interval of time were all found 

 to be combinations which gave the galvanic (or vol- 

 taic) shock, the same in kind, though varying in 

 strength. In all these cases, and in every production 

 of electricity by the voltaic process, the chemical action 

 of a fluid upon the metallic substance was a necessary 

 concomitant of the operation.* 



During the five following years Davy continued his 

 experiments ; and in the autumn of 1806 he commu- 

 nicated to the Royal Society his discovery of the con- 

 nexion between the different ends of the electric circle 

 and the different component parts of bodies submitted 

 to the action of the fluid. Nothing could be more 

 singular and unexpected than the laws which he now 

 found to regulate this operation, nor anything which 

 promised more clearly a rich harvest of new discoveries. 

 The effect of the current, whether of common or gal- 

 vanic electricity, in decomposing substances through 



* Subsequent experiments have shown that the effect may be produced 

 by other than metallic, or even carbonaceous bodies. 



