[ 92 J 
EXP. XI. 
I then fufpended, out of the thermometer, apiece 
of brafs wire, not quite fo fmall as the former, about 
twenty four inches long, with a pound weight at the 
lower end ; and, by fending the charge of the cafe 
of bottles thro’ it, difcovered a new method of wire- 
drawing. The wire was red hot, the whole length 
well anealed, and above an inch longer than before. 
A fecond charge melted it ; it parted near the middle, 
and meafured, when the ends were put together, four 
inches longer than at firft. This experiment I re- 
member you propofed to me, as worth trying, before 
you left Philadelphia; in order to find, whether the 
ele&ricity, in palling thro’ the wire, would fo relax 
the cohefion of its conftituent particles, as that the 
weight might produce a feparation; but neither of 
us had the leaft fufpicion, that any heat would be 
produced. 
EXP. XII. 
That I might have no doubt of the wire’s being hot 
as well as red, I repeated the experiment on another 
piece of the fame wire, encompaffed with a goofe- 
quill filled with loofe grains of gun-powder ; which 
took fire as readily, as if it had been touched with a 
read hot poker. Alfo tinder, tied to another piece 
of the wire, kindled by it. I tried a wire about 
twice as big, but could produce no fuch effe&s with 
that. 
Hence it appears, that the eledric fire, tho’ it has 
no fenfible heat when in a date of reft, will, by its 
violent 
