A View of the Apparatus and part of the Great Cylinder in the Pantheon

The Pantheon (Oxford Street) - Apparatus and part of the Great Cylinder. The Pantheon was erected in 1771 and converted to an opera house in 1791 but burnt down (and rebuilt) a year later. Its original use was for balls, 'routs' and masquerades. Same as 42.50/63. "The Tailors' Campaign", c 1835.

Benjamin Wilson conducting experiments with electrical conduction in 1777, frontispiece to Benjamin Wilson, An Account of the Experiments Made at the Pantheon on the Nature and Use of Conductors, London, 1778. Rooker's original watercolour for this print was sold for £20,000 at Christie's, 7 July 2010, lot 376.

Wilson performed his experiment before fellows of the Royal Society and member of the Board of Ordinance to stimulate the effects of a thunderstorm. The purpose of the experiment was to prove that round-headed conductors were more efficient than pointed conductors.