pot than your vessel underneath will receive.

JNO. FIELD.

* * * * *


_Effects of Lightning_.


The analogy between the electric spark, and more especially of the
explosive discharge of the Leyden jar, with atmospheric lightning
and thunder, is too obvious to have escaped notice, even in the
early periods of electrical research. It had been observed by Dr.
Wall and by Gray, and still more pointedly remarked by the Abbé
Nollet. Dr. Franklin was so impressed with the many points of
resemblance between lightning and electricity, that he was convinced
of their identity, and determined to ascertain by direct experiment
the truth of his bold conjecture. A spire which was erecting at
Philadelphia he conceived might assist him in this inquiry; but,
while waiting for its completion, the sight of a boy's kite, which
had been raised for amusement, immediately suggested to him a more
ready method of attaining his object. Having constructed a kite by
stretching a large silk handkerchief over two sticks in the form of
a cross, on the first appearance of an approaching storm, in June
1752, he went out into a field, accompanied by his son, to whom
alone he had imparted his design. Having raised his kite, and
attached a key to the lower end of the hempen string, he insulated
it by fastening it to a post, by means of silk, and waited with
intense anxiety for the result. A considerable time elapsed without