PRESENT STATE OF ORGANIC ELECTUICITV. 325 



An artificial transvcj'sc section is a section made at ri^ht 

 angles to the fibres. 



The natural or artificial extremities of fibres are transverse 

 section. -i. 



By employing a veiy delicate galvanometer, and by certain 

 refined precautions in the arrangement of his experiments, 

 T)u I'.ois licymond found that the lungitudinal section, natural 

 or artificial, is invarialjly positive in relation to tlie natural 

 or artificial tran-svcrsc section. The following are the general 

 laws of the dcrival muscular current. 



1. Tf any point of the natural or artificial longitudinal 

 section be put into connection, by means of the galvanometer, 

 with any point of the natural or artificial transvei-se section, 

 the needle will indicate a current in the wire from the longi- 

 tudinal to the transverse section. 



2. If one point of the natural or artificial transverse section 

 of a muscle is brought into connection with another point of 

 the same or of another similar transverse section, and if the 

 points be unequally distant from the centre of the section 

 considered as the base of a muscular cylinder, a current is 

 indicated passing from the electrode furthest from the centre, 

 and directed to that which is nearest to it. 



3. If we now consider the mass of the muscle as a cylinder, 

 and connect a point of the natural or artificial longitudinal 

 section nearer the middle transverse section of the mass, with 

 a point of the natural or artificial longitudinal section more 

 distant from the middle, a current is indicated passing from 

 the nearer to the more distant point. 



4. If both connected points of one or of two natural or 

 artificial transverse sections be equally distant fix)m the centre 

 of the surface, no current is indicated. So also in reganl to 

 longitudinal sections, points equally distant from the middle 

 produced no current. 



These laws are most satisfactorilv illustrated in the muscles 



