Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1890-04-10
A MARVELLOUS MACHINE.
An Apparatus that Works According to
the Directors Will.


The visit of certain French Count to
London has given US much to think of
beyond the limits of the disease. both
mental and bodily, assaied. This Count
P, who, strange to say, seeks no public
ity, is one of the most learned men in the
century. His studies have been followed
In participation with the experiments of
the great experimentalist, the late Ruhm-
korff. The latter was generous enough to
own that it was under the direction of
Count ?. that he accomplished most of his
greatest inventions. The wondrous reel
invented by the Count is still considered
the most marvellous conquest of science.
Upon this reel is wound a length of silver
wire measuring Is, 900 meters. The mag
netlc needles crossing each other in a
contrary direction are fixed upon the reel
and suspended by slender thread The
apparatus works under glass like watch,
so that no tampering with the mechanism
is possible. 1t is mounted moreover, on a
high stand. The count takes his hold of
the two conductors, says the Birmingham
Post, to which are attached the two ends
of the silver thread rolled upon tine reel,
ard bids you order the machine to move to
right or left, according to your will I'm
der this power alone, hitherto mlsunder-
stood or understood this, the mightiest
power in the universe, according to Count
P, the power of the human will-the
machine will act without the contact of
touch. To right, to left! will the reel re-
volve, according to the fancy of the Wis
itor.
Without speech, with out touch, by the
mere mental influence alone, will the
machine move in obedience to the unex-
pressed command. But not in all cases
does the machine answer unreservedly
1t is to the powerful will alone-the
concentrated and fixed determination
that it can be made to reply Ruhmkorff
used to laugh immoderately at the vacil-
lating movement of Count p s machine
when the savants of the Academy were
induced to try the experiment. With
some the wire would trembIe and
vibrate, then start to one side, then move
toward the other; with others it would re-
fuse to move at all, but confne its vibra-
ton to one spot. The experiments made by
Count P in London have all been exhibited
strictly in private. His object in coming
is merely to obtain wire more finely spun
than any he has hitherto been able to get
in Paris
They say that, contrary to the general
rule, the Count, from having been all his
life confirmed materialist, has been con-
verified to the highest degree of religious
faith, to conviction of the lofty destinies of
man, and his connection with the divinity;
man has abused his gifts and delivered
himself to evil, but the divine essence is
still within him. So fearful has the phi
losopher been of the pursuit of the fash
ionable lotteries who, under pretext of
scientific inquiry, merely seeks to derive
amusements from the most serious expert
ments in science, that ne has sought re-
treat in a convent near London, and his
excuse of being compelled to return
thither by s o'clock is made to reply to all
invitations to dinner or to ''select parties"
or to "small-and-earlies, with which the
ladies of London would seek to overwhelm
him.