me manner, they produced in
each of two volta-electrometers 21 cubical inches. In the first experiment
the whole consumption of zinc was 88.4 equivalents, and in the second only
48.28 equivalents, for the whole of the water decomposed in both
volta-electrometers.

1157. But when the twenty pairs of four-inch plates (1129.) were tried in
a similar manner, the results were in the opposite direction. With one
volta-electrometer 52 cubic inches of gas were obtained; with two, only
14.6 cubic inches from each. The quantity of charge was not the same in
both cases, though it was of the same strength; but on rendering the
results comparative by reducing them to equivalents (1126.), it was found
that the consumption of metal in the first case was 74, and in the second
case 97, equivalents for the _whole_ of the water decomposed. These
results of course depend upon the same circumstances of retardation, &c.,
which have been referred to in speaking of the proper number of plates
(1151.).

1158. That the _transferring_, or, as it is usually called, _conducting,
power_ of an electrolyte which is to be decomposed, or other interposed
body, should be rendered as good as possible[A], is very evident (1020.
1120.). With a perfectly good conductor and a good battery, nearly all the
electricity is passed, i.e. _nearly all_ the chemical power becomes
transferable, even with a single pair of plates (807.). With an interposed
nonconductor none of the chemical power becomes transferable. With an
imperfect conductor more or less of the chemical power becomes transferable
as the circumstances favouring the transfer of forces across the imperfect
conductor are exalted or diminished: these circumstances are, actual
increase or improvement of the conducting power, enlargement of the
electrodes, approximation of the electrodes, and increased intensity of the
passing current.

[A] Gay-Lussac and Thenard, Recherches Physico-Chimiques, tom. i. pp.
13, 15, 22.

1159. The introduction of common spring water in place of one of the
volta-electrometers used with twenty pairs of four-inch plates (1156.)
caused such obstruction as not to allow one-fifteenth of the transferable
force to pass which would have circulated without it. Thus
fourteen-fifteenths of the available force of the battery were destroyed,
local force, (which was rendered evident by the evolution of gas from the
being converted into zincs,) and yet the platina electrodes in the wat