266 
DR. DAVY’S ACCOUNT OF SOME EXPERIMENTS 
have been dwelt on by all inquirers who have paid any attention to this fish ; 
but I am not acquainted with any attempt to ascertain, by experiment, what is 
the exact nature of the substance of these organs, or the peculiar structure of 
which they are composed. 
When I have examined, with a single lens which magnifies more than two 
hundred times, a column of the electrical organs, it has not exhibited any 
regular structure ; it has appeared as a homogeneous mass, with a few fibres 
passing into it in irregular directions, which were probably nervous fibres. 
The specific gravity of the electrical organ, in comparison with that of parts 
of the fish decidedly muscular, is very low ; including the upper and under 
boundary of skin, I have found it 1*026, to water as 1*000. The specific gra- 
vity of a portion of the abdominal muscles of the same full-grown fish, was 
1*058, and that of the thick strong muscles of the back close to the spine 
1*065. 
The loss of weight which the electrical organ sustains by drying, is greater 
than I have observed in any other part of the fish. I shall give the results of 
one trial ; the statement will convey an idea of the bulk of the different parts 
of the torpedo, as well as of the proportion of solid matter which they contain. 
The subject of the experiment, procured fresh from the fish-market at Rome, 
was eight inches long, and across the widest part five inches broad. Entire 
it weighed 2065 grains. It was carefully divided, and the different parts men- 
tioned were found to weigh as follows, in their moist state: 
Grains. 
Spleen 5*5 
Pancreas 5*0 
Testes 3*0 
Kidneys 8*0 
A pale cream-coloured oval body close to left kidney . . 0*25 
A reddish oval body, like a gland, attached to the large 
intestine 0*5 
Liver, with gall-bladder and ducts 105*0 
Heart, and trunk of pulmonary artery 3*0 
Gills, including branchial cartilages 53*0 
Gullet 11*0 
Stomach 65*0 
