pedo was harmless; but when we breathed ever "so little, its efficacy took place."

Kempfer has very well described the effects of this animal's shock; but succeeding experience has abundantly convinced us, that holding in the breath no way guards against its violence. Those, therefore, who, depending on that receipt, should play with a torpedo, would soon find themselves painfully undeceived: not but that this fish may be many times touched with perfect security; for it is not upon every occasion that it exerts its potency: Reaumur, who made several trials upon this animal, has at least convinced the world that it is not necessarily, but by an effort, that the torpedo numbs the hand of him that touches it. He tried several times, and could easily tell when the fish intended the stroke, and when it was about to continue harmless. Always before the fish intended the stroke, it flattened the back, raised the head and the tail; and then, by a violent contraction in the opposite direction, struck with its back against the pressing finger; and the body, which before was flat, became humped and round.

But we must not infer, as he has done, that the whole effect of this animal's exertions arise from the greatness of the blow which the fingers receive at the instant they are struck. We will, with him, allow that the stroke is very powerful, equal to that of a musket-ball, since he will have it so; but it is very well known, that a blow, though never so great, on the points of the fingers, diffuses no numbness over the whole body such a blow must break the ends of the fingers indeed, but would hardly

numb the shoulder. Those blows that numb, must be applied immediately to some great and leading nerves, or to a large surface of the body; a powerful stroke applied to the points of the fingers will be excessively painful indeed, but the numbness will not reach beyond the fingers themselves. We must, therefore, look for another cause producing the powerful effects wrought by the torpedo.

Others have ascribed it to a tremulous motion which this animal is found to possess, somewhat resembling that of a horse's skin, when stung by a fly. This operating under the touch with an amazing quickness of vibration, they suppose, produces the uneasy sensation described above; something similar to what we feel when we rub plush cloth against the grain. But the cause is quite disproportioned to the effect; and so much beyond our experience, that this solution is as difficult as the wonder we want to explain.

The most probable solution seems to be, that the shock proceeds from an animal electricity, which this fish has some hidden power of storing up, and producing on its most urgent occasions. The shocks are entirely similar; the duration of the pain is the same but how the animal contrives to renew the charge, how it is prevented from evaporating it on contiguous objects, how it is originally procured, these are difficulties that time alone can elucidate.

But to know even the effects, is wisdom. Certain it is, that the powers of this animal seem to decline with its vigour; for as its strength ceases, the force of the shock seems to diminish; till, at last, when the fish is dead, the whole power is destroyed, and it may be handled or eaten with perfect security:

on the contrary, when immediately taken out of the sea, its force is very great, and not only affects the hand, but if even touched with a stick, the person finds himself sometimes affected. This power, however, is not to be extended to the degree that some would have us believe; as reaching the fishermen at the end of the line, or numbing fishes in the same pond. Godignus, in his History of Abyssinia, carries this quality to a most ridiculous excess he tells us of one of these that was put into a basket among a number of dead fishes, and that the next morning the people, to their utter astonishment, perceived, that the torpedo had actually numbed the dead fishes into life again.

To conclude, it is generally supposed that the female torpedo is much more powerful than the male. Lorenzini, who has made several experiments upon this animal, seems convinced that its power wholly resides in two thin muscles that cover a part of the back. These he calls the trembling fibres; and he asserts that the animal may be touched with safety in any other part. It is now known also, that there are more fish than this of the ray kind, possessed of the numbing quality, which has acquired them the name of the torpedo. These are described by Atkins and Moore, and found in great abundance along the coast of Africa. They are shaped like a mackarel, except that the head is much larger; the effects of these seem also to differ in some respects. Moore talks of keeping his hand upon the animal; which in the ray torpedo it is actually impossible to do. "There

was no man in the company," says he, " that could "bear to keep his hand on this animal the twentieth