SOME ELECTRICAL EXPERIMENTS.

Take a piece of common brown paper, about a foot in length, and half as wide.  Hold it before the fire till it becomes quite hot.  Then draw it briskly under your left arm several times, so as to rub it on both surfaces against the woolen cloth of your coat.  It will now have become so powerfully electrified, that if placed against the papered wall of the parlor, it will hold on for some time, supported, as it were, by nothing.

While the piece of brown paper is thus so strangely clinging to the wall, place a small, light, and fleecy feather against it, and this, in turn, will cling to the paper.

Now, again, make your piece of brown paper hot by the fire, and draw it, as before, several times under the arm.  Previously to this, attach a string to one corner, so that it may be held up in the air.  Several feathers, of a fleecy kind, may now be placed against each side of the paper, and they will cling to it for several minutes.

Another curious electrical experiment is to take a pane of common glass, make it warm by the fire, then lay it upon two books, allowing only the edges to touch the books, and rub the upper surface with a piece of flannel, or a piece of black silk.  Have some bran ready, strew it upon the table under the piece of glass, and the particles will dance.

TO CUT A PHIAL IN HALF.

Wind round it two bands of paper, corresponding in position to the two temperate zones of the earth, leaving a space between, corresponding to the equatorial zone.  Secure the two bands of paper with thread or fine twine.  Then wind a long piece of string once around the equatorial space.  Let an assistant hold one end of the string, and while holding the other end yourself, move the phial rapidly to and fro, so that the string shall work upon the glass between the two pieces of paper.  When the glass becomes hot in the equatorial space, pour some cold water upon it, and the glass will break as evenly as if cut with a knife.

[Illustration:  CUTTING THE PHIAL.]

The principle involved in this curious experiment may be applied to the removal of a glass stopper, when too tight in the neck of the bottle for the fingers to stir it.  All that is necessary is to wind a piece of thick string round the neck of the bottle, get an assistant to hold one end, and then work the bottle to and fro.  The glass of the neck will become so warm as to expand, and the stopper will become loosened.  It is often necessary to continue this friction for some minutes before the desired result is attained.

THE INVISIBLE RENDERED VISIBLE.

Place a coin in an empty basin, and let the basin be near the edge of the table.  Ask one of the company to stand beside it, and to retire slowly backward until he or she can no longer see the coin.  Then pour cold, clear water into the basin, and the person, who the moment before could not perceive the coin, now will see it quite plainly, though without moving a hair’s breadth nearer.