ELEMENTARY MAGHETIStt 367 



address Nature, and through which she sends her replies; 

 in the use of this language a lack of straightforwardness 

 is as possible, and as prejudicial, as in the spoken lan- 

 guage of the tongue. If, therefore, you wish to become 

 acquainted with the truth of Nature, you must from the 

 first resolve to deal with her sincerely. 



Now remove your needle from its loop, and draw it, 

 from eye to point, along one of the ends of the magnet; 

 resuspend it, and repeat your former experiment. You 

 now find that each extremity of the magnet attracts one 

 end of the needle and repels the other. The simple at- 

 traction observed in the first instance is now replaced 

 by a dual force. Repeat the experiment till you have 

 thoroughly observed the ends which attract and those 

 which repel each other. 



Withdraw the magnet entirely from the vicinity of 

 your needle, and leave the latter freely suspended by its 

 fibre. Shelter it as well as you can from currents of air, 

 and if you have iron buttons on your coat, or a steel 

 penknife in your pocket, beware of their action. If you 

 work at night, beware of iron candlesticks, or of brass 

 ones with iron rods inside. Freed from such disturb- 

 ances, the needle takes up a certain determinate position. 

 It sets its length nearly north and south. Draw it aside 

 and let it go.* After several oscillations it will again 

 come to the same position. If you have obtained your 

 magnet from a philosophical instrument maker, you will 

 see a mark on one of its ends. Supposing, then, that 

 you drew your needle along the end thus marked, and 

 that the point of your needle was the last to quit the 

 magnet, you will find that the point turns to the south, 

 the eye of the needle turning toward the north. Make 



