SUGGESTIONS ON ELECTRICITY. 
The existence of that etherial element which, for want of a better name, is called Electricity, and 
its presence in the atmosphere, are facts that few would be so hardy as to dispute : the periodicity also 
of its variations are perhaps equally established by well attested instrumental observations. Above 
twenty-three years ago, while in search of evidence in proof of the vital agency of Electricity, I met. with 
a letter signed " T. P.," on the Relation between Electricity and Vegetation, from which I borrow a few 
paragraphs — put, however, in the form of questions — in order to induce reflection : — Thus, assuming that 
vegetation extracts the etherial fluid from the atmosphere — Are not living plants and their juices pecu- 
liarly adapted to imbibe the effluvium ; and, is it not highly probable that they are indebted to its 
influence for their vitality ? Vegetables abound in pointed terminations communicating with juices 
passing through capillary tubes — Do not the leaves of trees, and even their fine ramifications, terminate 
in buds ? Will not a few blades of grass, held towards the knob of a charged jar, the circuit being 
completed by the human body, silently, but quickly discharge that jar without sensibly affecting the 
human frame ? Even a thorn or a thistle — will they not vie with, or excel, the sharpest needle in this 
discharging power, for, it may be observed, that they are far better fitted to act upon the electricity of 
the atmosphere, as the deposition of moisture (dew) consequent to the withdrawing of the effluvium 
which holds it in a state of vapour, so far from diminishing their power of conduction, as in the case of 
metals, is the very principle of their nutrition ? 
The repugnance with which the atmospheric electrical agency is met by some persons of high 
intellectual attainments is remarkable ; they are ready enough to talk of caloric — of heat, radiating 
and reflecting — of light, in the abstract, and of electricity as visibly developed by machines or the 
voltaic apparatus ; but they are contented to pass over the silent operations of that etherial element 
which pervades all nature — which is, and has been, excited by a breath of air, however inappreciable 
its force, and by the falling of a feather through that air, when even in the calmest state of repose. 
Since the year 1830, much light has been thrown upon electrical science by the publication of 
Professor Faraday's Elemental Researches. In the seventh series of that work (Anno 1834), many expe- 
riments are described which tend to establish the identity of chemical and electrical action ; but it is to 
the sections No. 860-2, on the quantity of electric force in matter, that we look for a positive and indis- 
putable proof of the energy which is universally distributed throughout every particle of matter, 
oi'ganic or inorganic! At No. 861, it is stated that the decomposition of a single grain of water 
required the passage of a quantity of electricity equivalent to 800,000 charges of a Leyden battery ; 
and, " considering that for a definite quantity of electricity passed, an equally definite and constant 
quantity of water, or other matter, is decomposed ; considering also that the agent, Electricity, is 
simply employed in overcoming electrical powers in the body subjected to its action, it seems probable, 
and almost a natural consequence, that the quantity which passes is the equivalent of, and therefore 
equal to, that of the particles separated ; i.e., that if the electrical power which holds the elements of a 
grain of water in combination, or which makes a grain of oxygen and hydrogen in the right proportion 
unite into water when they are made to combine, could be thrown into the condition of a cm-rent, it 
would exactly equal the current required for the separation of that grain of water into its elements again." 
Here a question of great moment presents itself : To what source are we to trace the Electricity 
which decomposes water into its rudimcntal elements, or separates its particles and brings them into 
that minute state of division wherein they exist as vapour or steam ? When an electric current is 
produced by the voltaic (galvanic) battery, it must be referred to the decomposition of water itself 
within the metallic cells, excited by the direct chemical action of the acids employed upon the zinc of 
the plates. Now, if chemical energy gives the first exciting spark, it is reasonable to infer that the 
reciprocating phenomena which follow in uninterrupted succession, must be electro-chemical. And 
again, if the volume of electricity thus developed in the cells, be obtained from a quantity of water so 
small as scarcely to be appreciated, that particle must have originally contained the quantity of elec- 
tricity, be it more or less, which it yielded as a current. 
Steam and vapour (whether produced by sensible heat, or naturally as they exist in haze and fog), 
consist of watery particles in a state of minute division, and kept asunder by electric repulsion. If 
these facts be admitted, then it will follow that water is one of the chief electrifying agents of nature. 
Those who oppose the theory appear to have founded their objections on experiments made upon 
plants by excited electric currents. When a free is struck by lightning, it receives injury to a greater or 
less extent ; but the mild inductive agency of the element, diffused throughout the atmosphere, is of a 
character widely different from that which it assumes when condensed within the volume of a thunder 
cloud. 
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