the quantity
of water decomposed by the wires in this experiment totally eluded
observation; it was immeasurably small; and still that amount of
decomposition involved the development of a quantity of electric force
which, if applied in a proper form, would kill a rat, and no man would
like to bear it.

In his subsequent researches 'On the absolute Quantity of Electricity
associated with the Particles or Atoms of matter,' he endeavours to give
an idea of the amount of electrical force involved in the decomposition
of a single grain of water. He is almost afraid to mention it, for he
estimates it at 800,000 discharges of his large Leyden battery. This, if
concentrated in a single discharge, would be equal to a very great flash
of lightning; while the chemical action of a single grain of water
on four grains of zinc would yield electricity equal in quantity to a
powerful thunderstorm. Thus his mind rises from the minute to the
vast, expanding involuntarily from the smallest laboratory fact till it
embraces the largest and grandest natural phenomena.[1]

In reality, however, he is at this time only clearing his way, and
he continues laboriously to clear it for some time afterwards. He is
digging the shaft, guided by that instinct towards the mineral lode
which was to him a rod of divination. 'Er riecht die Wahrheit,' said the
lamented Kohlrausch, an eminent German, once in my hearing:--'He smells
the truth.' His eyes are now steadily fixed on this wonderful voltaic
current, and he must learn more of its mode of transmission.

On May 23, 1833, he read a paper before the Royal Society 'On a new
Law of Electric Conduction.' He found that, though the current passed
through water, it did not pass through ice:--why not, since they are
one and the same substance? Some years subsequently he answered this
question by saying that the liquid condition enables the molecule
of water to turn round so as to place itself in the proper line of
polarization, while the rigidity of the solid condition prevents this
arrangement. This polar arrangement must precede decomposition, and
decomposition is an accompaniment of conduction. He then passed on to
other substances; to oxides and chlorides, and iodides, and salts, and
sulphurets, and found them all insulators when solid, and conductors
when fused. In all cases, moreover, except one--and this exception he
thought might be apparent only--he found the passage of the current
across the fused