produced by the Splashing of Mercury. 



469 



This pari o£ the curve is also a straight line. When a 

 voltage above Y n is reached the current will be given by 



k (Vjz^wj + V 2 w 2 ^2 + V 3 w 3 n 3 + 



h 



where the forms Vun are constant. This will be a straight 

 line parallel to the axis of x. Thus the curve should 

 gradually rise, never showing a flat part until all the ions 

 are removed. The curve evidently has not this form in 

 curve A in fig. 2. 



Further, if a voltage above 300 volts is put on the first 

 electrode, then there should be no current on the second, 

 since beyond this voltage the curve is flat. Thus a voltage 

 of 342 volts should drive all the ions on to the first electrode, 

 but in most cases observed (the exceptions are given later), a 

 current was found on the second of such a size that if it had 

 been due to free ions it should have shown on the saturation 

 curve. The numbers below show this : they refer to 

 different sets of observations with different electrometer 

 sensibilities, different heights of fall, &c, but the bracketed 

 pairs were taken under the same conditions except that the 

 field was reversed. 



V 1 the voltage on the first electrode ; 

 V 2 the voltage on the second electrode ; 

 c the current observed on the second electrode when the 



given voltage V was on the first ; 

 C the current observed on the second electrode when the 

 first was earthed. 



▼r 



v, 



c. 



C. 



598"] 

 -598J 



598-] 

 -598 J 



9 



277 





-25 



5981 

 -598 J 



598-1 

 -598 J 



8 



54 



8 



-18 



600-1 

 -600 J 



600-1 



-600 J 



7,8,7 



43 



8,8 



Small 



544"] 

 -544 J 



544~] 

 -544 J 



5,5 



20 



6,4 







The last resnlt is remarkable. A capacity had been 

 placed in parallel with the electrometer, and thus the 



