Masterpieces of Science 



developed in an instant by the electric spark; 

 the sudden expansion of air or steam in the 

 cavities of the wood causes an explosion. The 

 experiments of Professor Thomson confront him 

 with some of the seeming contradictions which 

 ever await the explorer of new scientific territory. 

 In the atmosphere an electrical discharge is 

 facilitated when a metallic terminal (as a light- 

 ning rod) is shaped as a point ; under oil a point 

 is the form least favourable to discharge. In the 

 same line of paradox it is observed that oil 

 steadily improves in its insulating effect the 

 higher the electrical pressure committed to its 

 keeping; with air as an insulator the contrary is 

 the fact. These and a goodly array of similar 

 puzzles will, without doubt, be cleared up as 

 students in the twentieth century pass from 

 the twilight of anomaly to the sunshine of as- 

 certained law. 



"Before there can be applied science there 

 must be science to apply, " and it is by enabling 

 the investigator to know nature under a fresh 

 aspect that electricity rises to its highest office. 

 The laboratory routine of ascertaining the con- 

 ductivity, polarisability, and other electrical 

 properties of matter is dull and exacting work, 

 but it opens to the student new windows through 

 which to peer at the architecture of matter. 

 That architecture, as it rises to his view, dis- 

 closes one law of structure after another; what 

 in a first and clouded glance seemed anomaly 

 is now resolved and reconciled; order displays 

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