Remo explained that the crystalline substance in the upper globe of the accumulator induced or gathered the electric current, giving it controllable direction as well as defined volume, while that in the lower determined its significance or divisional use.
In the minuter accumulators, for the lamps only, did the current present itself in the form of light, spark or flame. All the colors, from pure white to deep purple, with their prismatic variations, were the direct result of their differing chemical combinations in the lower globe, each of the silk-like wires throwing off countless rays of unvarying intensity and steadiness, but gave off no electric phenomena or effects.
The heat accumulators gave moderate or intense heat, according to the chemical combinations through which the primary current passed, but there was neither glow nor light-flash. So, too, the cold accumulators gave off varying degrees of cold, for the same reason.
In none of them was there either the electric shock or its effects, and all were tractable and free from danger in what we may term the electrical sense. The dynamic force of the primary and the intense heat or cold of the divisional currents, common prudence avoids. Still it would be easily possible, by chemical combination, to produce a current destructive of life and capable of annihilating nations, without hope or possibility of escape.
"Your own scientists know," said Remo, "that with the direct current all that you have seen, and infinitely more, is but the result of a simple process, capable of infinite multiplication."
"But what are the constituents of the medium in the accumulator, and what are the formulas of the various combinations?"
"If you knew that you would know as much as we."
This was the nearest a jest I had heard in Intermere, but I knew from the character of Remo's speech that the rest of the secret would remain hidden from me.
As we sat at his table later he said:
"You have been nearer to our secret than any one else in the outer world, and we shall see whether the seeds will grow into the tree of Knowledge and produce the fruits of Wisdom. Neither your people nor any other people could be trusted with this secret in their present moral condition. A few learned men dependent upon the rulers in one nation, knowing it, could and would plot the destruction and exploitation of all others. The sacrifice of human life and the accumulation of human woe and misery would be appalling.