137. The latter experiment is analogous to those made by Mr. Barlow with a rotating iron shell, subject to the influence of the earth[18]. The effects obtained by him have been referred by Messrs. Babbage and Herschel to the same cause as that considered as influential in Arago's experiment[19]; but it would be interesting to know how far the electric current which might be produced in the experiment would account for the deflexion of the needle. The mere inversion of a copper wire six or seven times near the poles of the magnet, and isochronously with the vibrations of the galvanometer needle connected with it, was sufficient to make the needle vibrate through an arc of 60° or 70°. The rotation of a copper shell would perhaps decide the point, and might even throw light upon the more permanent, though somewhat analogous effects obtained by Mr. Christie.
138. The remark which has already been made respecting iron (66.), and the independence of the ordinary magnetical phenomena of that substance and the phenomena now described of magneto-electric induction in that and other metals, was fully confirmed by many results of the kind detailed in this section. When an iron plate similar to the copper one formerly described (101.) was passed between the magnetic poles, it gave a current of electricity like the copper plate, but decidedly of less power; and in the experiments upon the induction of electric currents (9.), no difference in the kind of action between iron and other metals could be perceived. The power therefore of an iron plate to drag a magnet after it, or to intercept magnetic action, should be carefully distinguished from the similar power of such metals as silver, copper, &c. &c., inasmuch as in the iron by far the greater part of the effect is due to what may be called ordinary magnetic action. There can be no doubt that the cause assigned by Messrs. Babbage and Herschel in explication of Arago's phenomena is the true one, when iron is the metal used.
139. The very feeble powers which were found by those philosophers to belong to bismuth and antimony, when moving, of affecting the suspended magnet, and which has been confirmed by Mr. Harris, seem at first disproportionate to their conducting powers; whether it be so or not must be decided by future experiment (73.)[20]. These metals are highly crystalline, and probably conduct electricity with different degrees of facility in different directions; and it is not unlikely that where a mass is made up of a number of crystals heterogeneously associated, an effect approaching to that of actual division may occur (127.); or the currents of electricity may become more suddenly deflected at the confines of similar crystalline arrangements, and so be more readily and completely discharged within the mass.
Royal Institution, November 1831.
Note.—In consequence of the long period which has intervened between the reading and printing of the foregoing paper, accounts of the experiments have been dispersed, and, through a letter of my own to M. Hachette, have reached France and Italy. That letter was translated (with some errors), and read to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, 26th December, 1831. A copy of it in Le Temps of the 28th December quickly reached Signor Nobili, who, with Signor Antinori, immediately experimented upon the subject, and obtained many of the results mentioned in my letter; others they could not obtain or understand, because of the brevity of my account. These results by Signori Nobili and Antinori have been embodied in a paper dated 31st January 1832, and printed and published in the number of the Antologia dated November 1831 (according at least to the copy of the paper kindly sent me by Signor Nobili). It is evident the work could not have been then printed; and though Signor Nobili, in his paper, has inserted my letter as the text of his experiments, yet the circumstance of back date has caused many here, who have heard of Nobili's experiments by report only, to imagine his results were anterior to, instead of being dependent upon, mine.
I may be allowed under these circumstances to remark, that I experimented on this subject several years ago, and have published results. (See Quarterly Journal of Science for July 1825, p. 338.) The following also is an extract from my note-book, dated November 28, 1825: "Experiments on induction by connecting wire of voltaic battery:—a battery of four troughs, ten pairs of plates, each arranged side by side—the poles connected by a wire about four feet long, parallel to which was another similar wire separated from it only by two thicknesses of paper, the ends of the latter were attached to a galvanometer:—exhibited no action, &c. &c. &c.—Could not in any way render any induction evident from the connecting wire." The cause of failure at that time is now evident (79.).—M.F. April, 1832.