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with an ele&rical magazine, compofed of pieces of 
iron, tin plates, gilt paper, and fueh-like, fuftained 
by filken cords; and I obferved, i. That the electri- 
cal fluid did not even then adt with any more ftrength 
upon minute bodies prefented to the wire. 2. That, 
in depriving this magazine of its electricity, it feem'd 
to return the more flowly, the more conflderable the 
magazine was ; whereas the contrary happens during 
a florm. This flownefs, with which the common 
electricity of the air is propagated, makes me defpair 
of finding means capable of rendering its motion £en~ 
Able. 
Ob/. 4. 
It does not appear to me, that hurricanes and tem- 
pefts increafe the electricity of the air, when they 
are not accompanied with thunder : for, during three 
days of a very violent continual wind in the month 
of July, we were obliged to put the duft withinfour 
or five lines of the conductor, before any fenfible at- 
traction could be perceived. The direction of the 
winds, whether eaft, weft, north, or fouth, does not 
make any fenfible alteration in the electricity of the 
air, except when they are moift. In the moft dry 
.nights of this fummer, I could obferve no figns of 
electricity in the air ; but it returned in the morning, 
as I have faid, when the fun began to appear above 
the horizon, and vaniflied again in the evening, about 
half an hour after fun-fet. The ftrongeft common 
electricity of the atmofphere, during this hummer, 
was perceived in the month of July, on a very dry 
day, the heavens being very clear, and the fun ex- 
tremely hot. The diftance of ten or twelve lines 
B bb 2 was 
