VOL. XLVI.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 13 



Bases (at fVittemlerg) Experiment of Beatification, or causing a Glory to 



appear round a Mans Head by Electricity. N" 494, p. 348. 



The inquiry into the nature and properties of electricity has been, within 

 these few years, the pursuit of many excellent and ingenious persons ; and most 

 of its extraordinary phenomena, which have been made to appear in one place, 

 have, with proper attention to the requisite circumstances, appeared in others : 

 but there have happened two very remarkable exceptions to this rule. The first 

 is, that the odours of odoriferous substances do not only pervade, from friction, 

 the glasses which contain them, but that these odours were carried along with the 

 current of electricity into such non-electric bodies as were destined to receive 

 them, and manifested themselves in those bodies by communicating to them 

 their smell and other properties. These, and other things yet more extraordi- 

 nary, were said to have been performed by Mr. Pivati at Venice, and to have 

 been repeated by Mr, Winkler at Leipsic ; but, though no care or expence has 

 been spared, either by Abbe NoUet at Paris, Mr. Jallabert at Geneva, Mr. 

 Bose at Wittemberg, Pere Garo at Turin, and by Mr. W. himself at London, 

 to bring about the same effects, they have hitherto been unsuccessful. For 

 which reason the truth of these relations has been greatly questioned by many ; 

 as Mr. Buccamare, in a treatise * since published, says, that Mr. Pivati con- 

 fessed to those who addressed themselves to him to see the experiments, that 

 more especially made with balsam of Peru, that it never succeeded but once, and 

 that he could never repeat it. Mr. W. likewise received a letter from the Abbe 

 NoUet, who is just returned to Paris from Turin and Italy. He says, that his 

 first care was to inquire into the truth of those wonders in electricity, of which 

 we have heard so much for almost 3 years : and he imagines the Royal Society 

 would be glad to know what they really were : for which reason he has just now 

 sent a memoir to the duke of Richmond, in which will be seen the most circum- 

 stantial account he has been able to procure of them at Turin, at Venice, and at 

 Bologna. For his own part, he thinks that there has been a great deal of pre- 

 judice, credulity, and exaggeration ; to which may be added, very little care and 

 caution in making these experiments. He is now sorry he has lost so much 

 time in attempting to make them ; and thinks Mr. Winckler has been too hasty 

 in asserting, that he had repeated these Italian experiments : but why should he 

 call thein Italian, when the nation he says will not allow the appellation, and, 

 except 3 persons, he finds there no defender of what has been said to be done ; 

 and adds, that there is not a philosopher of repute there, who believes them any 

 more than himself? 



The other is, an experiment called by Professor Bose at Wittemberg, the 



• Tentamen de Vi Electric. &c. p. 1 83.— Orig. 



