Of the numberless attempts made to elucidate the phenomena of electricity, in connection with the formation of thunderstorms, none seem more worthy of regard, and of thoughtful consideration, than those of Jean Athanase Peltier, a French savant, little known to the general world. Born in 1785, he occupied his whole life, until his death in 1845, with the study of meteorology and electricity, making, among others, the important discovery that a current flowing through a circuit composed of two metals joined together heats or cools the junction according to the direction of the current. From all the experiments upon the phenomena of electricity, to which he devoted his life, Peltier drew the conclusion that the earth itself, and more particularly the fiery liquid mass forming the inner bulk of it, over which the solid crust and the ocean lie, but both thinner in comparison than the skin of an apple, form one immense reservoir of electricity. As light comes from the sun, generated, as we believe, by heat, so the electric force, he held, comes from the interior of the globe, likewise generated by heat. The atmosphere surrounding the globe, Peltier asserted, produced no electricity whatever, nor held it, except temporarily. But he thought it possible that it might exist, engendered by other flaming masses than those of the earth’s interior, in the interminable planetary spaces, which no astronomer can measure, and of which imagination itself, in its loftiest flights, can form no more conception than the finite ever can of the infinite. On the whole, Peltier’s explanation, such as it is, may fairly be accepted, in the present state of the scientific investigation, as one of the best that can be given. For the rest, men must content themselves to study the phenomena of electricity, and to regard it simply as one of the great, if mysterious, forces of nature. [Illustration] CHAPTER VII. INQUIRIES INTO LIGHTNING PROTECTION.