Electricity. One of the hidden and mysterious powers of nature, which man has brought under control to serve his ends, and which manifests itself mainly through attraction and repulsion; the most powerful and yet the most docile force known to man, coming from nowhere and without form, weight, or color, invisible and inaudible; an energy which fills the universe and which is the active principle in heat, light, magnetism, chemical affinity, and mechanical motion.
Electricity, Atmospheric. The electric currents of the atmosphere, variable but never absent. They include lightning, frictional electricity, the Aurora Borealis, the electric waves used in wireless telegraphy, etc. Benjamin Franklin indicated the method of drawing electricity from the clouds. In June, 1752, he flew a kite, and by its moistened cord drew an electric current from the clouds so that sparks were visible on a brass key at the ground end of the cord. Later, when a fine wire was substituted for the cord, and a kite was flown in a thunder-storm, the electric spark was vivid. This experiment confirmed his hypothesis that lightning was identical with the disruptive discharges of electricity.
Electricity, Latent. The bound charge of static electricity.
Electricity, Negative. (See [Negative Electricity].)
Electricity, Positive. (See [Positive Electricity].)
Electricity, Voltaic. Electricity of low potential difference and large current intensity.
Electricity produced by a voltaic battery or dynamo as opposed to static electricity, which is frictional and practically uncontrollable for commercial purposes.
Electrification. The process of imparting an electric charge to a surface. The term is applied chiefly to electro-static phenomena.
Electrization. In electro-therapeutics, the subjection of the human system to electric treatment. An electric tonic imparted by electro-medical baths through the nervous system.
Electro-chemistry. That branch of science which treats of the relations between electric and chemical forces in their different reactions and compounds. It deals with electro-plating, electro-fusing, electrolysis, etc.