f 6 J 
it fhould feem that this queftion is de¬ 
cided. Profeffor Galvani, of Bologna, 
has difcovered in animals an eledricity 
which is peculiar to them, and which 
performs the office of the nervous fluid. 
For this beautiful difcovery, he was in¬ 
debted to a fortunate accident. Whilft 
diffeding a frog in a room where fome of 
his friends were amufing themfelves with 
an eledrical machine, one of them drew 
a fpark from the condudor, at the fame 
time that the profeffor touched one of the 
nerves of the animal. In an infant, the 
whole body of the frog was fhook by a 
violent convulfion. The profeffor w T as 
aftonifhed at the phenomenon, and be¬ 
lieved it owing to his having wounded the 
nerve j to allure himfelf whether this was 
really the cafe, he pricked it with the 
point of his knife, without any motion 
of the body being produced j he now ' 
touched the nerve with the inflrument as 
>\ V 
' at 
