Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 14.djvu/575

Rh 1853 an attempt was made to organize a company in Paris for the purpose of procuring, through the decomposition of water by a powerful magneto-electric machine constructed by M. Nollet, the oxygen and hydrogen necessary for the lime-light. The experiment failed, but the apparatus by which it was attempted suggested to Mr. Holmes other and more hopeful applications. Abandoning the attempt to produce the lime-light, with persevering skill Holmes continued to improve the apparatus and to augment its power, until it was finally able to yield a magneto-electric light comparable to that of the voltaic battery. Judged by later knowledge, this first machine would be considered cumbrous and defective in the extreme; but, judged by the light of antecedent events, it marked a great step forward.

Faraday was profoundly interested in the growth of his own discovery. The Elder Brethren of the Trinity House had had the wisdom to make him their "Scientific Adviser"; and it is interesting to notice, in his reports regarding the light, the mixture of enthusiasm and caution which characterized him. Enthusiasm was with him a motive power, guided and controlled by a disciplined judgment. He rode it as a charger, holding it in by a strong rein. While dealing with Holmes, he states the case of the light pro and con. He checks the ardor of the inventor, and, as regards cost, rejecting sanguine estimates, he insists over and over again on the necessity of continued experiment for the solution of this important question. His matured opinion was, however, strongly in favor of the light. "I beg to state," he writes in his report to the Elder Brethren, "that, in my opinion. Professor Holmes has practically established the fitness and sufficiency of the magneto-electric light for lighthouse purposes, so far as its nature and management are concerned. The light produced is powerful beyond any other that I have yet seen so applied, and in principle may be accumulated to any degree; its regularity in the lantern is great; its management easy, and its care there may be confided to attentive keepers of the ordinary degree of intellect and knowledge." As regards the conduct of Professor Holmes during these memorable experiments, it is only fair to add the following remark with which Faraday closes the report submitted to the Elder Brethren of the Trinity House on the 29th of April, 1859: "I must bear my testimony," he says, "to the perfect openness, candor, and honor of Professor Holmes. He has answered every question, concealed no weak point, explained every applied principle, given every reason for a change either in this or that direction, during several periods of close questioning, in a manner that was very agreeable to me, whose duty it was to search for real faults or possible objections in respect both of the present time and the future."

Soon afterward the Elder Brethren of the Trinity House had the intelligent courage to establish the machines of Holmes permanently at