Page:A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism - Volume 2.djvu/118

 Rh current was passed downward through a vertical wire. If, either during the passage of the current or after it has ceased, the wire be twisted in the direction of a right-handed screw, the lower end becomes a north pole.

Here the downward current magnetizes every part of the wire in a tangential direction, as indicated by the letters NS.

The twisting of the wire in the direction of a right-handed screw causes the portion ABCD to be extended along the diagonal AC and compressed along the diagonal BD. The direction of magnetization therefore tends to approach AC and to recede from BD, and thus the lower end becomes a north pole and the upper end a south pole.

Effect of Magnetization on the Dimensions of the Magnet. 448.] Joule , in 1842, found that an iron bar becomes lengthened when it is rendered magnetic by an electric current in a coil which surrounds it. He afterwards shewed, by placing the bar in water within a glass tube, that the volume of the iron is not augmented by this magnetization, and concluded that its transverse dimensions were contracted.

Finally, he passed an electric current through the axis of an iron tube, and back outside the tube, so as to make the tube into a closed magnetic solenoid, the magnetization being at right angles to the axis of the tube. The length of the axis of the tube was found in this case to be shortened.

He found that an iron rod under longitudinal pressure is also elongated when it is magnetized. When, however, the rod is under considerable longitudinal tension, the effect of magnetization is to shorten it.