Vital and Physical Motion. \ 29 



were used, to 10, or thereabouts, if water were sub- 

 stituted for brine. Nobili supposed that this current 

 was peculiar to the frog, and in this he erred ; but he 

 did, nevertheless, a great thing, for, by this experiment, 

 he furnished the first unequivocal proof of the real 

 existence of animal electricity. 



Twelve or thirteen years later, Matteucci published 

 an essay* which, as M. De la Rive says,f ' restored to 

 animal electricity the place which it ought to occupy in 

 electrical and physiological phenomena.' This essay, 

 moreover, had a great indirect influence upon the for- 

 tunes of animal electricity, for M. Du Bois-Reymond, as 

 he himself tells us, was led to undertake the investiga- 

 tions which have made his name famous in this depart- 

 ment of physiology by the inspiration arising from its 

 perusal. 



The joint labours of MM. Matteucci and Du Bois- 

 Reymond have left no room for entertaining any doubt 

 as to the reality of animal electricity. This will appear 

 sufficiently in the sequel, when many of the experiments 

 which furnish the demonstration will have to be referred 

 to particularly. In the meantime, it may be said that 

 Matteucci has demonstrated in the most unequivocal 

 manner that animal electricity is capable of decompos- 

 ing iodide of potassium, and of giving ' signes de 

 tension avec un condensateur delicat,'| as well as of 

 producing movement in the needle of the galvanometer ; 

 and not only so, but also a fact, the discovery of which 

 will always give Matteucci a place in the very foremost 

 rank of physiological discoverers-^-that muscular con- 



* " Tfaite des Phenomenes Electro-physiologiqwes des Animaux." 

 Paris. 1844. 



t " A Treatise on Electricity, in Theory and Practice." Translated by 

 C. V. Walker. 8vo. Longman. 1853-1858. 



J "Coarsd'Electro- Physiologic." Paris. 1858. 



