long-sparking

Updated: May 3, 2025

Associates it with Italians and fluency generally, with Volta, Galvani, Marconi and so on. The proper British electricity is that high-grade useless long-sparking stuff you get by turning round a glass machine; stuff we used to call frictional electricity. Keep it in Leyden jars.... At Claverings here they still refuse to have electric bells.

H. G. (Herbert George) Wells - Mr. Britling Sees It Through