Excerpt from The London, Edinburgh and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, Vol. 8: July December, 1854

In the year 1805, M. Schwartz, inspector of one of the smelting-works of Saxony, having a quantity of silver in a ladle which had just solidified after melting, and, wishing to hasten its cooling, placed it upon a cold anvil, when to his astonishment sounds, which he compared to those of an organ, proceeded from the mass. The rumour of this discovery excited the curiosity of Professor Gilbert, the editor of Gilbert's Annalen, and in the autumn of the same year he paid a visit to the smelting-works in question. He there learned that the piece of silver from which the sounds proceeded was cup-shaped, had a diameter of 3 or 4 inches and a depth of half an inch. Gilbert himself, under the direction of M.Schwartz, repeated the experiment. He heard a distinct tone, although nothing that he could compare to the tone of an organ. He also found that the sound was accompanied by the quivering of the mass of metal, and that when the vibrations of the mass ceased, the sound ceased likewise. The Professor limited himself to the description of the ph?nomenon, and made no attempt to explain it.

In the year 1829 Mr. Arthur Trevelyan was engaged in spreading pitch with a hot plastering iron, and observing in one instance that the iron was too hot, he laid it slantingly against a block of lead which happened to be at hand.

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