90 ; ELECTRO-CULTURE. 
being familiar to many present here, and for that reason will 
presumably inspire a general local interest. 
With the aid of a small grant from the Development 
Fund, through the Board of Agriculture, experiments were 
started at Lincluden Mains in the year 1912, and have been 
continued on the same ground from that date up to the 
present, the work conducted being under the close supervision 
of scientific experts appointed by the Board. 
Before pursuing the subject further, it might be as well 
to give a brief description of the apparatus employed and 
the ground over which it was used. 
The field treated has a number of ordinary telegraph 
poles surmounted by powerful insulators, round which is fixed 
a strong wire about No. 14 gauge; from this wire, which is 
arranged in the form of a square, very fine wires are 
stretched at intervals of 25 feet from each other, forming a 
network over the plot to be subjected to the electric treat- 
ment, while a similar plot without any network is marked 
off for purposes of comparison. 
To charge the network an apparatus is used which was 
designed for the purpose by Sir Oliver Lodge; it consists of 
a large induction coil with sparkgaps, similar to that used in 
X-ray work, five vacuum globes through which one current 
—the positive—is guided to the overhead wires in the field, 
the negative current being connected to a zinc plate about 
three feet square sunk into the ground; the small current of 
electricity required to excite the coil is obtained from a 
storage battery of 30 cells, and in the coil is transformed up 
to the enormous potential of 100,000 volts. 
As the two signs of. electricity—the positive and nega- 
tive—have a natural affinity for each other, they are con- 
tinuously striving to reach each other through the air space 
which separates them, and anyone walking below the wires, 
when the atmosphere is slightly moist, will experience che 
sens‘ition as if a cobweb was on his face, which is caused by 
the discharge. 
While this discharge of electricity is going on, from the 
-wires to the earth and vice-versa, a minute current passes 
through the plants. 
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