392 Matteucci’s Lectures on Living Beings. 
The intensity of the current is in proportion to the number of 
demi-thighs or pigeons employed to form the pile. Matteucci 
ascertained by various trials that this current did not depend on 
the nervous system. 
‘The origin of this current resides in the electric conditions 
which are produced by the chemical actions of the nutrition of 
liquid compose the elements of a pile; they are the liquid acid 
an 
Matteucci, in his tenth lecture, treats of electric fishes, show- 
ing the identity of the force with electricity and its general 
character in different animals. In concluding this subject, he 
speaks of what he designates the proper current of the frog. 
Proper current of the frog.—After mentioning a simple mode of 
experiment, he says: ‘ The signs of the current are augmented in 
intensity, if in place of a single frog, I form a pile with a number 
of them is arrangement is very easily understood: I employ 
the varnished tray before spoken of, when treating of the mus- 
cular current. I place on it some frogs, prepared in such a way 
that the nerves of the first animal touch the legs of the second, 
and the nerves of the second, the legs of the third, and so on. I 
thus have a pile, one extremity of which is formed by the legs, 
and the other by the nerves. I plunge the two poles of this pile 
into cavities of the tray, which contain either a very weak saline 
solution, or distilled water. Into these I also put the two ex- 
tremities of the two wires of the galvanometer. It is seen that 
the needle deviates, and indicates precisely, as in the experiment 
of Nobili, the existence of a very energetic current which circu- 
lates from the legs to the nerves in each of the frogs which form 
the pile. Ihave repeated and varied in a thousand ways this 
experiment, which has enabled me to ascertain that the variation 
of the needle is proportional to the number of frogs composing 
the pile; that it is more considerable when we employ an alka- 
line or saline solution, or better still, an acid solution, than when 
we employ distilled water; that, whatever be the liquid employ- 
ed, the direction of the current is constant, and circulates always 
in the pile from the feet to the upper part of the frog. Recently, 
studying more attentively the proper current, I have satisfied 
myself that it isa phenomenon which appertains to all animals. 
‘Having thus ascertained the conditions on which the proper 
current depends, I think that I may generalize its origin, ant 
connect it with the muscular current. ‘This community of on- 
gin is principally demonstrated by the identity of action which 
the different circumstances that modify the organism and life of 
animals, exercise upon the muscular current.’ 
