The Works of Dr. Benjamin Franklin (Volume 3); Philosophical. Essays and Correspondence (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated.1809 Excerpt: ... posterity of mankind, and make the name of FRANKLIN, like that of NEWTON, immortal. I am, Sir, with sincere respect, Your most obedient and humble servant, EBEN. KINNERSLEY. TO MR. KINNERSLEY. Answer to some of the foregoing subjects.--How long the Leyden hot' tie may be kept charged.--Healed glass rendered pcrmeable by the electric fluid--Electrical attraction and repulsionj--tie/rfy to othei subjects in the preceding paper.--Numerous ways of kindling Fire. Explosion of water.--Knobs and points. London, February 20, 1762. Sir, I RECEIVED youi4 ingenious letter of the 12th of March last, and thank you cordially for the account you give me of the new experiments you have lately made in electricity.--It is a subject that still affords me pleasure, though of late I have not much attended to it. Your second experiment, in which you attempted, without success, to communicate positive electricity by vapor ascending from the electrised water, reminds me of one I formerly made, to try if negative electricity might be produced by evaporation only. I placed a large heated brass plate, containing four or five square feet on an electric stand: a rod of metal, about four feet long, with a bullet at its end, extended from the plate horizontally. A light lock of cotton, suspended by a fine thread from the deling, hung opposite to, and within an inch of the bullet. I then sprinkled the heated plate with water, which arose fast from it in vapor. If vapor should be disposed to carry off the electrical, as it does the common fire from bodies, I expected the plate would, by losing some of its natural quantity, become negatively electrised. But I could not perceive, by any motion in the cotton, that it was at all affected: nor by any separation of small cork balls suspended fro...