282 Literary and Philosophical Society. 



kites are immersed are at altitudes corresponding to the 

 series 1,2, 3, 4, 5, their relative states of positive electricity 

 would be conveniently represented by those numbers. 



' Besides the above and a multitude of other researches 

 which we have not room to notice, but which in a complete 

 biography it would be impossible to pass in silence, Mr. 

 Sturgeon was an ardent admirer and diligent observer of 

 those grand and magnificent instances of the Creator's 

 power which are exhibited alike in the lightning flash and 

 the silent corruscations of the aurora borealis. Most 

 graphic and highly interesting accounts of these natural 

 phenomena appear interspersed among his more elaborate 

 papers. 



'The magnitude of Mr. Sturgeon's scientific labours 

 would naturally lead one to imagine that his whole life 

 was given up to original investigation. On the contrary, 

 a large portion of his time was occupied in communicating 

 his stores of knowledge to others. For several years he 

 filled, with great credit to himself, the chair of Experimental 

 Philosophy in the Hon. East India Company's Military 

 Seminary, Addiscombe. In 1838 he accepted the office 

 of superintendent of the Royal Victoria Gallery of Practical 

 Science in this town ; and subsequently to the failure of 

 that institution, through the pressure of the times, he made 

 strenuous, though unfortunately unsuccessful, efforts to 

 establish another institution of a kindred character. As a 

 lecturer, he was distinguished by the happy facility with 

 which he conveyed the truths of science to his hearers, and 

 the uniform success of his experimental illustrations. Nor 

 did he confine his efforts to mere oral enunciation. The 

 numerous elementary treatises which he published on 

 electricity, magnetism, and chemistry, show the desire he 



