Energy and Ether. 1027 



ether belonging to and about the disc of the telephone, or the rotating 

 armature of the dynamo? The magnet is a body which constitutes the 

 home, harbor or den of a quantity of partially condensed ether. At 

 the time the steel was magnetized this ether was set to moving with a 

 wonderfully persistent motion, the movement being partly inside the 

 magnet, and partly in the field surrounding it. Now when an armature 

 or a diaphragm containing a quantity of similar ether having a like fun- 

 damental tone, is pushed into the field of the magnet, that half of the 

 motion of the magnetic ether that is outgoing resists the push and sends 

 the ether of the armature back upon itself, making the momentary 

 short current or jerk. When the armature is pulled away again, its ether 

 being caught in the return or ingoing half of the ether of the magnet, the 

 pull is resisted, and a short current or jerk takes place in a direction op- 

 posite the first. The magnet loses none of its force by this operation, 

 but the alternating jerky currents are at the expense of the energy that 

 moves the armature. The action with the armature is like a man in a 

 boat alternately pushing and pulling himself from and to the wharf, and 

 thereby creating currents in the water. The currents are at the ex- 

 pense of his own energy. 



Since there is ether in all bodies it might be asked why any other sub- 

 stance might not do for an armature as well as iron. Iron is best 

 adapted for the armature of a dynamo probably because its ether is of 

 the density and tone best adapted for encountering the resistance of the 

 ether of the machine, and the rest of the circuit. At all events the es- 

 sential point is that the current is set up by the ether introduced into 

 and withdrawn from the circuit, and not by the iron which goes along 

 as its carrier. If this is the case, it is reasonable to suppose that other 

 means might exist for setting up the motion of the ether in a circuit 

 beside flourishing an iron armature through it. The metallic disc of 

 the Bell telephone, as observed before, does not touch the magnet but is 

 supposed to shake itself within the magnetic field, the ether attached to 

 it alternately encountering the outgoing and ingoing currents of the 

 magnet, and delivering the motions to the ether of the wire in the cir- 

 cuit. But it appears that the agitation may be communicated from a 

 vibrating body to the air, as in the case of the microphone, and then as 

 may be inferred, it is the ether contained in the air which disturbs that 

 of the circuit. 



In the case of the microphone, figure 401, the ticking of a watch or 

 the perambulation of a fly on the instrument, is supposed to agitate the 

 air and cause the spring to vary the pressure by which the buttons of 

 carbon are held together, and so by making the connection alternately, 

 more complete and less complete, the current is made to vary. The 

 same principle is involved that governs in the case of the dynamo, and 



