279 PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO I746. 



electrical matter is conveyed, has been found too great to be yet determined with 

 any exactness. The author made an experiment with an iron wire of 950 toises 

 in length, 'and he was not able to observe, that there passed so much as a quarter 

 of a second of time, between the wire's receiving the electricity at one end, and his 

 feeling the shock in both his arms at the other ; which infers a velocity at least 

 30 times as great as that with which sounds are propagated. 



In seeking what might be the force which shot forward the electric matter, 

 with so much rapidity, through the length of the wire, he at first thought it 

 might be performed by the explosion of the spark of fire, which is perceived when 

 the electrified phial is brought into contact with the wire conducting the electric 

 matter; but the following experiment soon convinced him he was mistaken. He 

 disposed horizontally a wire folded in 2, on lines of silk; the whole length of this 

 wire was of ISIQ feet, and the 2 parallel halves were about 6 feet distant from 

 each other. The electricity was then communicated by means of a phial ; and it 

 preserved itself in the wire for several minutes, by reason of the silken lines on 

 which this was supported : a finger was then brought to one of its extremities, to 

 take away the virtue ; and in the same instant it ceased also at the other extremity 

 of the vidre : so that in this case the matter in question returned to the finger, 

 that is, marched backward, with the same velocity with which it was before shot 

 forward : the electric matter therefore now came towards the explosive spark, for 

 this spark appeared on the finger as soon as it approached the end of the wire to 

 take away its electricity, and therefore it is not this spark which shoots forward 

 the electric matter with so great a velocity. 



The last part of the memoir concerns the proportion in which the electric mat- 

 ter is communicated to bodies of the same nature. And here the author first 

 establishes, that it is not communicated to homogeneous bodies, in proportion to 

 their masses or quantities of matter, but rather in proportion to their surfaces. 

 Yet all bodies having equal surfaces do not receive equal quantities of electricity : 

 those receive the most, whose surfaces are extended the most in length. Thus a 

 square sheet of lead receives a much less quantity of electricity, than a long strip 

 of the same metal with a surface equal to that of the square sheet : insonmch 

 that the only way to increase in any body its faculty of receiving the electric 

 virtue, is to continually increase its length. 



Of a very Large Stone, found in the Colon of a Horse ; and of Several Stones 

 taken from the Intestines of a Mare. By Edward Bailey, M. D. of Havant 

 in Hampshire. N° 481, p. 296. 



The horse in which the large stone was found, belonging to a miller, had been 

 fed with bran only for several years. He was observed to be in pain sometimes, 

 but never so bad as to be hindered from his work, till the day of his death ; when 



