eless fully recognizes that its own reign had been
a thousand times longer than that of the lucifer match. If we could only
hear that tinder-box talk, I think we should find it saying something of
this kind to the lucifer match--"I gave way to you, because my time was
over; but mind, your turn will come next, and you will then have to give
way to something else, as once upon a time I had to give way to you."
And that is the end of the first chapter of my story of a tinder-box.

LECTURE II.

We were engaged in our last lecture in considering the various methods
that have been adopted from early times for obtaining fire, and we left
off at the invention of the lucifer match. I ventured to hint at the
conclusion of my last lecture, that the tinder-box had something to say
to the lucifer match, by way of suggestion, that just as the lucifer
match had ousted it, so it was not impossible that something some day
might oust the lucifer match. Electricians have unlimited confidence (I
can assure you) in the unlimited applications of electricity:--they
believe in their science. Now one of the effects of electricity is to
cause a considerable rise of temperature in certain substances through
which the electrical current is passed. Here is a piece of platinum
wire, for example, and if I pass an electrical current through it, you
see how the wire glows (Fig. 14). If we were to pass more current
through it, which I can easily do, we should be able to make the
platinum wire white hot, in which condition it would give out a
considerable amount of light. There is the secret of those beautiful
incandescent glow lamps that you so often see now-a-days (Fig. 15).
Instead of a platinum wire, a fine thread of carbon is brought to a very
high temperature by the passage through it of the electrical current,
in which condition it gives out light. All that you have to do to light
up is to connect your lamp with the battery. The reign of the match, as
you see, so far as incandescent electric lamps are concerned, is a thing
of the past. We need no match to fire it. Here are various forms of
these beautiful little lamps. This is, as you see, a little rosette for
the coat. Notice how I can turn the minute incandescent lamp, placed in
the centre of the rose, off or on at my pleasure. If I disconnect it
with the battery, which is in my pocket, the lamp goes out; if I connect
it with my battery the lamp shines brilliantly. This all comes by
"swit