Electricity was a property but imperfectly understood by the ancients; indeed, it has been said, they were entirely unacquainted with it. But we propose, shortly, to show the extent to which we are informed their sphere of knowledge extended. This much cannot be denied, that they were acquainted with the electrical properties of amber, of which fact we are informed by Pliny.

Even before Pliny, however, as early as the days of Thalis, who lived near six hundred years anterior to the Roman historian, the Miletine philosophers ascribed the attractive power of the magnet and of amber to animation by a vital principle. Our word “electricity” appears to be derived from the name the Latins gave to amber, electrum. It is also evident that they were acquainted with the shock of the torpedo; although they were ignorant, as are the moderns, of the concealed cause of this effect.

It has been asserted that the ancients knew how to collect the electrical fire in the atmosphere; and it is also said, that it was in an experiment of this nature that Tullus Hostilius lost his life. Etymologists have carried us still farther back, and assert that it was from the electrical property in the heavens that Jove obtained his surname of Jupiter Eliaus. This, however, may be only conjectural.

The first discoveries made of sufficient importance to demand the appellation of “scientific” in the science of electricity, were effected by Dr. W. Gilbert, the result of which he gave the world, in the year 1660, in a book then published, entitled “De Magneto,” and Dr. Gilbert was followed in his pursuits by that celebrated scientific character, the honourable and illustrious Boyle, and other men eminent for that species of information.

This science was successfully cultivated in the last century by many eminent philosophers, among whom we may mention Hawkesbee, Grey, Muschenbrook, Doctors Franklin and Priestly, Bishop Watson, Mr. Cavendish, and several other members of the Royal Society of England; whilst those worthy of the true philosophic character in France did not neglect its cultivation.

Many fatal accidents have resulted from experiments made by people ignorant of the science. On the 6th of August, 1753, at Petersburg, Professor Richmann lost his life by endeavouring to draw the electric fluid into his house.

Electricity, like many others of the arcana of nature, still retains almost as deeply shaded from human view as when its existence was first made known. Nature appears to have certain secret operations, which are not yet, perhaps, to be revealed.

ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH.

This is the most surprising invention of modern times, and of the greatest importance to a commercial people; by means of it intelligence is conveyed from one end of the kingdom to another, in the twinkling of an eye. A company was fully organised for the carrying out this invention, which commenced its operations in 1848, and established a system of no ordinary complication and extent. Their wires stretch from Glasgow on the north, to Dorchester, on the south, from the east coast, at Yarmouth, to the west, at Liverpool. These have brought upwards of one hundred and fifty towns into instant communication with each other. The wires set up for the use of the public alone are upwards of nine thousand eight hundred miles in length, and extend over a distance of two thousand and sixty miles, and, exclusive of those running underground, and through tunnels or rivers, are stretched on no fewer than sixty-one thousand eight hundred posts, varying from sixteen to thirty feet in height, and of an average square of eight inches, with an expensive apparatus of insulators and winders attached to each. As the most trifling derangement of the wires or apparatus will stop the communication, it is obvious that the utmost care and watchfulness is requisite to prevent and detect accidents. Accordingly, the whole distance is divided into districts, each district having a superintendent, and under him several inspectors, and a staff of workmen, batterymen, and mechanics, more or less numerous, according to the extent over which he presides.—When we consider these things, in conjunction with the central staff of engineers, secretaries, &c., at the head-establishment in London, a maximum charge of one penny per mile cannot be considered an exorbitant demand for the accommodation afforded to the public in keeping open so many receiving stations, and the maintenance of the expensive establishments. The telegraphic system is designed for important and urgent messages, and it may be safely averred that not one despatch in a hundred has been as yet forwarded by it, which has not been by many times worth more than the sum paid by the sender. A commercial house in Liverpool will scarcely grudge 8s. 6d. for a communication by which a necessary payment may be made, an important order given, or a profitable operation facilitated in London; and the message from Glasgow, which traverses a distance of five hundred and twenty miles in an instant, to summon a son from the metropolis, it may be, to the bedside of a dying parent, cannot be judged exorbitant at a charge of 14s., considerably less than one halfpenny per mile.

Messrs. Wilmer and Smith, of Liverpool, publishers of the “European Times,” have arranged the most admirable code of signals in the world; and by the use of forty-eight letters are capable of transmitting intelligence equal to half a column of an ordinary newspaper. The telegraphic company disapprove of this species of short-hand, and, therefore, charge for the forty-eight letters 13s. This Messrs. Wilmer and Smith consider excessive, as they have forwarded similar messages by telegraph, four thousand miles in America, for 8s., and from Philadelphia to New York for 1s. These gentlemen, therefore, consider they have cause to find fault with the company in reference to charges for communications in cipher.