Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 453 



it is weak inasmuch as the cause assigned is extremely local in its 

 action, while the phenomena to be explained are very general and 

 have a wide range — terraces similar to those of Glen Roy occurring 

 in Scandinavia and elsewhere. In the author's opinion, also, the 

 ice-dam is impossible, and would be inefficient if possible ; it would 

 not be watertight, and there is no place for it in the history of the 

 Postpliocene changes in Scotland. But he remarked that objec- 

 tions like these cannot be urged against the Marine theory, as the 

 sea has been on the spot, and is able to perform the work required 

 of it. At the same time the author admitted that the Marine 

 theory is not free from difficulties, the chief being the perfection and 

 horizontality of the " Roads," and their barrenness in marine organ- 

 isms ; and he concluded by suggesting some explanations of these 

 apparent anomalies. 



LXVII. Intelligence and Miscellaneous Articles. 



ON THE ELECTRICITY OF THE TORPEDO. 

 BY M. CH. MATTEUCCT. 



TN the structure and electric function of the organ of the torpedo, 

 ■*- as far as we are at present acquainted with it, there is evidently 

 still a very obscure but very important problem, which we shall sooner 

 or later solve : I mean that of the relation existing between the 

 function of the nerves and electricity. Being convinced that my 

 later experiments upon the electromotor power of the organ of 

 the torpedo in a state of repose are calculated to throw great light 

 upon this problem, I was unwilling to lose the opportunity offered by 

 a very brief stay at Via Reggio, a seaport from which I procured 

 a large number of torpedoes when I was at Pisa, to repeat the most 

 interesting of these experiments. 



There is no difficulty in discovering the electromotor power of 

 the organ of the torpedo independently of the discharge, in the 

 state which I have called that of repose : it is only requisite to pos- 

 sess a galvanometer sensitive to the muscular current of the frog, and 

 to close the ends of the instrument with two plates of amalga- 

 mated zinc plunged in sulphate of zinc, and communicating with 

 each other by pads of flannel or filtering-paper. The galvanometer 

 which I used was not provided with a good astatic system ; so that 

 I only obtained a deviation of from 40 to 45 degrees with the 

 gastrocnemius of a not very lively frog. With this instrument, a 

 piece of the organ cut from a small torpedo which had ceased to 

 give discharges, produced a deviation of 14 or 15 degrees in the 

 same direction of the current as that obtained at the moment of 

 the discharge. This result is constant. The following are the 

 principal results at which I arrived, and which confirm my former 

 experiments. 



1. A piece of the electric organ, cut from a torpedo which gave 

 no sensible discharge to the galvanoscopic frog when its skin was 

 irritated, gives a constant current between the dorsal and abdominal 

 surfaces in the same direction as the discharge obtained on pulling 



