The sun. [volume] (Morris, Stevens County, Minn.) 1882-1895, 1889-10-24
"THE GENIE ELEcTRON."
An Element That Plays a Part I'm
Most Natural Phenomena.

An Element That Plays a Part I'm
Most Natural Phenomena.
Madison Buell., the repeater chief of
the Western Union Telegraph company,
recently read paper before the Elec-
trical society of Buffalo on the spirit of
electricity, or, as he calls it, ''Ihe Ge-
ME Electron." The genie performs an
important part in almost all the opera
tions of nature, but generally in so
quiet a manner that his presence is
never known or even suspected except
In the occurrence of something calcu-
lated to arouse him to anger or oppo-
sition. "It is," said Mr.. Buell., "in the
bright clouds, far above the earth, that
he sometimes likes to nestle, or when
their bases touch the mountains and
their white tops shine in the far-of
ether he will stretch forth his powerful
form and seem to battle himself in the
tenderest purple of distance. At other
times he will softly breathe his spirit in
the air, sigh, and send his moan along
the woods and moorish fens, and up
among the loose, disjointed cliffs as the
sad notes of the coming storm. When
the black-winged legions of tempest
arise, he delights in leaping from cloud
to cloud, and the tremendous roar of
his voice is rolled back from the noun
tain's bosom as the recognition of the
dazzling brightness of his flashing eye.
Calm and serene he drives the furious blast,
And. pleased tn Almightys order to perform,
Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm.
The exhibition OF his fearful strength
at such times makes towards of US all.
Fear, full of feeble fancies, makes US
weak and unmanly, loosens in us every
power, and allows our imagination to
create fantastic shapes of the hideous
ruin he may create. The immensIty of
his force naturally inspires mankind
with terror and awe, and, until recent
ly, they have looked upon him more in
the light of Gods minister of punish
ment and destruction than as the
friendly and benefcient. though pow
erful, being they are discovering him
to be. His favorite place of retirement
is in the deep interior of the earth, and
while thus pent up, and finding no
ready means of escape, he will some
times break the bonds of his prison,
and in doing so shake the earth for
miles around, leaving great rents in it,
overturning buildings, destroying life
and property, as was so forcibly dem
onstrated in the late earthquakes at
Charleston and vicinity"
After referring in detail to some of
the famous earthquakes of modern
times, Mr.. Buell. asked whether 1t is
not possible that the cause of these
disturbances is due to the chemical
action of which "Electron' is supposed
to be the immediate agent when
the particles of different kinds of mat
ter are free to mingle with each other.
which by means of heat, air, water, and
other media they can be made to do,
'Electron' can make them change their
arrangements and can subject them to
such magical transformations that they
become entirely new substances, with
qualities essentially different from their
previous condition. The presence of
subterranean waters is able to bring
about greater and more prompt accu-
mutation of electricity in the parts of
the ground that are near to them, the
metallic veins or conducting rocks that
penetrate to great depths and extend
to great distances are apt to convey,
according to their direction, any quaint
ity of 'Electron's' spirit. Might not
the subterranean noises, very similar
to rolling thunder, which generally
precede and frequently accompany
violent earthquakes, be caused by the
explosion of this accumulated electric
ity, and which we might term subter-
ranean lightning? If we obtain such
enormous quantities of his spirit on II
small scale, as we do from our voltaic
cells and from our dynamo machinery,
is there any reason to doubt that in the
interior of our globe, where all the
operations of nature are carried on
upon scale of magnitude almost be-
yond our conception, when discharge
of this nature docs occur, that it can
be of sufficient force to produce un-
dulatory waves and TO lift the crust of
the earth at such points as the force
may happen to be the greatest?"