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f 
3 
é 
J. Tyndall on Atmospheric Radiation. 101 
air which filled the Royal — theatre, during the delivery of the 
discourse, absorbed 90 or 100 times the quantity of piss heat which 
was absorbed by the main body of the air of the roo 
Looking at the single atoms, for every 200 of onyget and nitrogen 
there is about 1 of aqueous vapor. s 1, then, is 80 times more ache 
erful than the 200; and hence, sigan a single atom of oxygen o 
nitrogen with a single atom of aqueous vapor , we may infer that the 
action of the latter is 16, 000 times that of the form er. This was a very 
n 
testing it to the uttermost. From such opposition, a discovery, if it be 
name, emerges with its fibre strengthened; as the human 
vee gathers force iin the healthy .antagonisms of active life. It 
as urged, that the result was on the face of it improbable; that there 
te moreover, many ways of accounting for it, without ascribing so 
ous a comparative action to aqueous vapor. For example, the 
surface of a plate of les eee, and it is well known abot brine is very 
plate upon a screen, the a breathed through a tub for a moment 
on the salt; brilliant colors of thin plates (soap-bubble colors) flashed 
forth immediately upon the screen—these being caused by the film of 
formed when undried air is sent into the cylinder; it was, therefore, 
the absorption of a layer of brine which was measured, instead of he 
“oe of salt when pets to ictest examination show sage 
of a film of moisture. Secondly, s abolishing the plates of . alto- 
gether, and obtaining the same results in a cylinder open at ends, 
ari and the 
sea-beach near Black Gang Chine. @ aqueous vapor of the air from 
— localities intercepted at least seventy times me amount of radiant 
€ radiation, The - pet pieaies a wags —You permit molt 
