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Accordingly he ranged a number of ribbands, of all 
the primitive colours, hanging them in the fame ver- 
tical plane ; and to thefe he applied an excited glafs 
tube, in an horizontal direction. — Upon this he ob- 
ferved, that the black was firft attracted ; and, as he 
brought the tube nearer, the white next ; and the reft 
fucceffively, though not always in the fame order. 
He made another experiment, in the fame view, with 
gauzes of different colours, through which he tried 
the force of an excited tube, upon light bodies placed 
at a proper diftance behind them : and from the re- 
fult he was of opinion, there was fomething in the 
influence of colours. But having afterwards tried 
fome experiments with the coloured rays of the fun 
as refradted by a prifm, with flowers of different co- 
lours, and with white ribbands rubbed over with dif- 
ferently coloured fubftances, he began to change his 
opinion. He likewife had recourfe to what he calls 
a deciflve experiment: he dipped his different-colour- 
ed ribbands in water ; and when they were all equal- 
ly wetted, he applied his tube, and found they were 
all equally 'attradfed. From this laft-mentioned ex- 
periment, in particular, he concluded that colours, as 
colours, had no effedt in eledlricity ; but that all was 
owing to the ingredients of the dye imbibed by the 
coloured body. 
It is not my purpofe here to inquire, whether 
Monf. Du Fay’s conclufion is well or ill founded. 
Whatever may be the decifion of that point, I ap- 
prehend the whole of this affair hath very little con- 
cern with what hath been the fubjedt of thefe papers, 
and could have been of little ufe to me, had I been 
acquainted with it before. 
The 
