So far as we know, nothing of much importance has yet been inferred from such experiments as these. Davy and Faraday, however, and their pupils, did not confine their attention to these barren wonders. Sir Humphry Davy took the "pile" as invented by Volta, in 1800, and founded by its assistance what may be styled a new science, and developed it to the point where it became available for the arts and utilities of man. The simple and easy process by which silver and gold are decomposed, and then deposited upon metallic surfaces, is only one of many ways in which the galvanic battery ministers to our convenience and pleasure. If the reader will step into a manufactory of plated ware, he will see, in the plating-room, a trough containing a liquid resembling tea as it comes from the teapot. Avoiding scientific terms, we may say that this liquid is a solution of silver, and contains about four ounces of silver to a gallon of water. There are also thin plates of silver hanging along the sides of the trough into the liquid. The galvanic battery which is to set this apparatus in motion is in a closet near by. The vessels to be plated, after being thoroughly cleaned and exactly weighed, are suspended in the liquid by a wire running along the top of the trough. When all is ready, the current of electricity generated by the small battery in the closet is made to pass through the trough, and along all the metallic surfaces therein contained. When this has been done, the spectator may look with all his eyes, but he cannot perceive that anything is going on. There is no bubbling, nor fizzing, nor any other noise or motion. The long row of vessels hang silently at their wire, immersed in their tea, and nobody appears to pay any attention to them. And so they continue to hang for hours,--for five or six or seven hours, if the design is to produce work which will answer some other purpose than selling. All this time a most wonderful and mysterious process is going on. That gentle current of electricity, noiseless and invisible as it is, is taking the silver held in the solution, and laying it upon the surfaces of those vessels, within and without; and at the same time it is decomposing the plates of silver hanging along the sides of the trough in such a way as to keep up the strength of the solution. We cannot recover from the wonder into which the contemplation of this process threw us. There are some things which the outside and occasional observer can never be done marvelling at. For our part, we never hear the click of a telegraphic apparatus without experiencing the same spasm of astonishment as when we were first introduced to that mystery. The beautiful manner, too, in which this silvering work is done! The most delicate brush in the most sympathetic hand could not lay on the colors of the palette so evenly, nor could a crucible melt the metals into a completer oneness.