FOOTNOTES.
We suppose every particle of sand, moisture, or smoke, being first attracted and then repelled, carries off with it a portion of the electrical fire; but that the same still subsists in those particles, till they communicate it to something else; and that it is never really destroyed.—So when water is thrown on common fire, we do not imagine the element is thereby destroyed or annihilated, but only dispersed, each particle of water carrying off in vapour its portion of the fire, which it had attracted and attached to itself.
Our tubes are made here of green glass, 27 or 30 inches long, as big as can be grasped. Electricity is so much in vogue, that above one hundred of them have been sold within these four months past.
To charge a bottle commodiously through the coating, place it on a glass stand; form a communication from the prime conductor to the coating, and another from the hook to the wall or floor. When it is charged, remove the latter communication before you take hold of the bottle, otherwise great part of the fire will escape by it.
The river that washes one side of Philadelphia, as the Delaware does the other; both are ornamented with the summer habitations, of the citizens, and the agreeable mansions of the principal people of this colony.
An electrified bumper, is a small thin glass tumbler, near filled with wine, and electrified as the bottle. This when brought to the lips gives a shock, if the party be close shaved, and does not breathe on the liquor.
Thunder-gusts are sudden storms of thunder and lightning, which are frequently of short duration, but sometimes produce mischievous effects.
See the ingenious essays on electricity in the Transactions, by Mr Ellicot.
See the first sixteen Sections of my former Paper, called Farther Experiments, &c.
See § 10 of Farther Experiments, &c.
In the dark the electrical fluid may be seen on the cushion in two semi-circles or half-moons, one on the fore part, the other on the back part of the cushion, just where the globe and cushion separate. In the fore crescent the fire is passing out of the cushion into the glass; in the other it is leaving the glass, and returning into the back part of the cushion. When the prime conductor is apply'd to take it off the glass, the back crescent disappears.
Gilt paper, with the gilt face next the glass, does well.
See farther experiments, § 15.