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ELECTRICITY AND VEGETATION. 
The theory of Electro-culture is of general application : it is either a fiction, a 
fallacy, or it is founded upon natural phenomena, which can neither be controverted 
nor disproved. 
When Dr. Forster announced his electrical experiments upon farm crops, he 
appeared to have acted upon the principle of an hypothesis advanced by M. Ampere, 
a French philosopher, namely, that the magnetism of the earth was induced by a 
continuous stream or current of electricity round the globe from east to west : he 
therefore placed his long poles, and strained his receiving wires between their sum- 
mits, in a direction north and south, corresponding with that of the magnetic meri- 
dian. But we are not sure that such a current prevails, although the diurnal motion 
of the earth from west to east might appear to sanction the idea ; and therefore Mr. 
Sturgeon (in the last section of his Electrical Essay, to which we referred last month,) 
proposes a new modification of apparatus founded upon the prevailing currents of 
the wind. 
" Since then," he says, " there is no reason to believe that a continuous electric 
tide in the air sweeps the surface of the land from east to west, nor any means at 
our disposal to confine electric influences within the limits of a marginal wire in the 
ground ; there is no authority from facts for making choice of the magnetic meridian, 
nor ought it to be expected that any gain is to be derived by bordering a plot of land 
with those that are underground. The prevailing winds in most parts of Great 
Britain are easterly in the spring, and westerly during most parts of the summer ; 
therefore a wire is stretched in a N.E. and S.W. direction, and another, beneath or 
above, crossing it at right angles uear the middle" (see the 
figure). Mr. Sturgeon uses the words " pairs of wires," 
but it is evident that one wire across each pair of poles, 
is what he intended to express. 
The wires ought to be copper, because that metal is 
a better conductor, and is not so liable as iron to be 
corroded and oxidised. The poles should be elevated far 
above the influence of the plants which it is intended to 
excite, and they should also be remote from tall trees. 
The very mention of the latter, as excellent natural conductors, is sufficient to 
substantiate the theory of vegetable attractive power. 
It is not unlikely that where it is the object of the gardener to excite oblong or 
oval beds of plants, he would prefer the system of underground wires passing around 
the plot, and connected with the upper supplying wire by others descending by the 
poles, and fastened to those within the soil. But according to the improved modifi- 
cation by Mr. Sturgeon, " the principal wires at the bottom of the system, which 
VOL. XIII. NO. CLT. X 
