192 
MR. GASSIOT ON THE POSSIBILITY OF OBTAINING A SPARK, ETC. 
content myself by briefly referring to those which are now generally received as 
axioms in electrical science. 
The effects that are obtained from different sources of electricity, as well as those 
obtained from different forms and dimensions of the voltaic battery, have been con- 
veniently generalized under the terms quantity and intensity. Let us now examine 
the results obtained by the experiments detailed in this paper ; a series of one hun- 
dred of Professor Baniell’s constant battery, excited with strong acid solutions, will 
scarcely affect the leaves of a delicate gold-leaf electroscope, yet a single excitation 
by a silk handkerchief on the glass globe by which they are surrounded, will rend 
the leaves of such an instrument to shreds ; and we find that the space occupied by 
a single fold of a silk handkerchief, or even a piece of tissue paper, is sufficient to 
insulate a power, which after the circuit has been once completed will ignite upwards 
of sixteen feet of thick platinum wire and fuse titanium into a solid mass, effects 
never, I believe, before obtained by the voltaic battery. 
A one thousand series of Zamboni’s piles is sufficient to elicit a distinct spark to 
the measured space of g^ths of an inch ; yet these different results are at once as- 
sumed as being due to what is usually denominated quantity and intensity. 
It has been often urged that any objection which may have arisen as to the iden- 
tity of electricity and galvanism, was at once removed by the fact of a spark of the 
latter being capable of passing through space, or what is usually denominated the 
striking distance ; and it argues little for the correctness of our experimental investi- 
gations, that such an important fact, (although perhaps until it is more satisfactorily 
proved it can scarcely be assumed as a fact,) one apparently so easy of confirmation, 
should rest on one or two doubtful and isolated experiments. Although I must con- 
sider that Professor Daniell laboured under some error when he describes the dis- 
charge passing in the form of a spark (8.) when the cells were approximated, yet I 
cannot but feel that it will be with the aid, and through the principles of this philo- 
sopher’s scientific apparatus, which he has so appropriately denominated the constant 
battery, that the true principles of voltaic action will be correctly ascertained. There 
is already one fact which was obtained with the 160 pairs (10.) which cannot, I be- 
lieve, be satisfactorily accounted for by any of the existing theories. I allude to the 
remarkable heating of the positive electrode two inches beyond the part where the 
circuit was com pie ted *. 
Before 1 conclude, I should wish it to be distinctly understood that I offer no opinion 
as to the possibility of obtaining the striking distance or spark before contact ; I 
merely present an account of those experiments which have been made by me to ob- 
tain it. That according to the present theoretical views of the action of the voltaic 
battery, with the apparatus I used, it ought to have taken place, I think most persons 
will acknowledge ; and also, that if by still more powerful apparatus it cannot be pro- 
duced, the theory must in some way or other be incorrect. 
* Transactions of the Electrical Society, Part I. p. 65. 
