抄録
It has been well known that the carbon has three states of aggregation : amorphous, graphite and diamond, among which graphite is a good conductor, whereas the other two are non-conductors. When wood materials are heated, they are at first turned into the amorphous carbon, and if we keep heating them for a long time, they gradually are converted into the graphite. And the higher the temperature of heating, the shorter is the time necessary for the conversion.
Now in a long run of the electric leakage, through wire-laths inside the wall of houses, the wire would be burned down, and at this moment of breaking, an electric arc of a very high temperature would appear and heat the surface of the wood materials, changing them into graphite in an instant. Then the current passes through the graphite surface and, keeping it white-heated, the current makes the neighbouring layer of wood change into graphite again. Thus the carbonization progresses deeper and deeper to the inner part, and at last the wood materials come to emit flames, resulting an outbreak of fire in the wall.
