[ 36(3 ] 



XLI. On the Electric Discharge in Rarefied Gases. 

 By Dr. Eugen Goldstein*. 



Lt 



I HAVE shown in two former papers \, and more com- 

 pletely in my book ' A New Form of Electrical Repul- 

 sion ' (published by Springer, Berlin), that the discharge 

 cannot be effected by the actual projection of gas-particles. 

 The same considerations which oppose the theory of the pro- 

 pagation of electricity by projected gas-particles, also at once 

 exclude the assumption that other ponderable particles, having 

 access to the space in which the discharge takes place, play 

 any essential part as carriers of electricity in the discharge. 

 Such particles might consist of disintegrated portions of the 

 substance of the electrodes, particles of the wall of the vessel, 

 or of dust. 



The theory that the kathode-rays at any rate are produced 

 by projected particles of the substance of the electrodes has 

 been recently defended by Gintl§ and Puluj||. Numerous 

 argumentsU may be urged against it, over and above those 

 which are at the same time opposed to a special convection by 

 the particles of the gas. I will briefly mention one or two 

 points. I have mentioned on a former occasion** that a system 

 of pores in an insulator, or a single opening of relatively small 

 dimensions, sends out rays whose properties are equivalent to 

 those of the rays which issue from a metallic kathode. The 

 rays of narrow openings, for example, possess the property of 

 rectilinear radiation, and of exciting phosphorescence, which 

 cannot here be explained by a projection of the substance of 

 the pole. 



Kathodes imitated by systems of pores represent special 

 cases of the phenomenon of secondary negative light, which is 



* Translated from the Annalen der Physik und Chemie, 1881, new 

 series, vol. xiii. Communicated by the Author. 



t The readers of this Magazine will find that some observations and 

 conclusions in the first chapter of the above paper, concerning the conduc- 

 tivity of vacuum, do not differ front the views expressed by Prof. Edlund 

 in a paper reprinted in the January number of the Philosophical Magazine 

 for 1882. I beg to mention therefore, that my paper appeared in print 

 in the February number (1881) of Wiedemann's Annalen, and that Prof. 

 Edlund presented his to the Pioyal Swedish Academy, April 23, 1881. 



X Phil. Mag. [5] x. pp. 173 & 234. 



§ Gintl, * Studies of Crookes's Ptadiant Matter ' (Prague, 1880). 



|| Puluj, Sitzungsberkhte Wien. Akad. 1880, p. 864. 



«fl E.Wiedemann (Wied. Ann. x. p. 252, 1880, Phil. Mag. x. p. 418) thinks 

 it possible to conclude from Zahn's experiments (Wied. Ann. viii. p. 675, 

 1879) that the view of Gintl and Puluj is untenable. 



»* Phil. Mag. x. p. 177. 



