The Electrification of the Air

Abstract

IN writing upon the electrical condition of the Peak of Teneriffe, the Hon. Ralph Abercrombie (NATURE, vol. xxxvii. p. 31), begins by stating that “the limited number of observations on atmospheric electricity which have been already made all point, with one exception, to a normal positive difference of potential between a point some few feet above the earth and the ground itself;” and farther on he writes: “the electrical conditions of the Peak of Teneriffe [the one exception] were the same as in every other part of the world.” As similar statements still find their way into text-books and treatises on electricity and meteorology, I trust you will permit me to point out that, unless a very special meaning be attached to the word “normal,” this generalization is decidedly too wide.