formed of a hollow brass reel on which a long copper wire covered with silk is coiled. In the clock-case, on either side are magnets, fixed so that their opposite poles enter the reel.

Our readers have already been informed that a magnet freely supported, as in the mariner's compass, will move when the Amber Spirit passes over it. We will now confide to them another secret, namely, that a fixed magnet will give motion to a moveable wire along which the Spirit is passing. We shall now be able to explain the motion of our magic pendulum.

As soon as the Spirit is sent along the coil of wire, the pendulum moves towards one side, being attracted by the one magnet and repelled by the other; but by an ingenious contrivance the connexion between the coil and the battery is now broken, and the pendulum falls back by its own weight, again to be pulled aside by the magnets. The pendulum is thus made to oscillate; and so long as there is power enough in the battery to force the Spirit through the coil, it will keep swinging, and give motion to a series of wheels acting upon each other which carry round the hands of the clock.*

Other methods have been devised to render the Spirit an effective time-keeper, but the simple arrangement we have described may be taken as the type of them all.

* Bain's Electric Clock.

The great peculiarity of these wonderful clocks is, that they may be connected by wires, and made to keep exactly equal time, though separated from each other by hundreds of miles. With a single battery of sufficient power all the clocks in London might be kept going; and what is still more extraordinary, the London clocks might be made to regulate those of Edinburgh and Dublin, or even those of Paris and New York!

The Spirit has been employed to move more ponderous things than pendulums. He has been taught to turn a lathe, work a pump, and propel a boat through the water; but as it is much more expensive to evoke the Spirit by means of metals and acids, than to raise Steam from water, he is not likely to supersede Steam as a mover of machinery.

In the useful Arts the Amber Spirit has long been employed as a worker of metals, and with his assistance we now cast copper medallions, vases, and statues, without making use of a furnace; we gild or silver all kinds of utensils, and cover the most delicate productions of nature with thin films of metal. We will proceed to consider these mysterious operations. When the Spirit is made to travel through a solution of copper, silver, or gold, he decomposes it, and deposits the metal, particle by particle, on the wire which conducts him back to the battery. Now by attaching a suitable model or mould to this wire we can procure this metallic

deposit in any shape, and by substituting any utensil for this mould, we may cover it with a film of gold or silver.*

We have not done full justice to our Spirit's abilities, as we have omitted to mention the many services he has rendered to the astronomer, the geographer, the chemist, and the physician; we have said enough, however, to give the reader an idea of his versatile powers.

We have shown that he can travel with the rapidity of thought across a continent or an ocean; that he can write and print our messages in the most distant places; that he can measure time as it flies, move all kinds of machinery, and melt copper in cold water. We may search through our old fairy tales and romances in vain to find a spirit capable of performing such miracles as these.

* The Electrotype.