Page:A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism - Volume 2.djvu/36

 Rh 375.] The accuracy of this law may be considered to have been established by the experiments of Coulomb with the Torsion Balance, and confirmed by the experiments of Gauss and Weber, and of all observers in magnetic observatories, who are every day making measurements of magnetic quantities, and who obtain results which would be inconsistent with each other if the law of force had been erroneously assumed. It derives additional support from its consistency with the laws of electromagnetic phenomena.

376.] The quantity which we have hitherto called the strength of a pole may also be called a quantity of Magnetism, provided we attribute no properties to Magnetism except those observed in the poles of magnets.

Since the expression of the law of force between given quantities of 'Magnetism' has exactly the same mathematical form as the law of force between quantities of 'Electricity' of equal numerical value, much of the mathematical treatment of magnetism must be similar to that of electricity. There are, however, other properties of magnets which must be borne in mind, and which may throw some light on the electrical properties of bodies.

Relation between the Poles of a Magnet.

377.] The quantity of magnetism at one pole of a magnet is always equal and opposite to that at the other, or more generally thus:—

In every Magnet the total quantity of Magnetism (reckoned algebraically) is zero.

Hence in a field of force which is uniform and parallel throughout the space occupied by the magnet, the force acting on the marked end of the magnet is exactly equal, opposite and parallel to that on the unmarked end, so that the resultant of the forces is a statical couple, tending to place the axis of the magnet in a determinate direction, but not to move the magnet as a whole in any direction.

This may be easily proved by putting the magnet into a small vessel and floating it in water. The vessel will turn in a certain direction, so as to bring the axis of the magnet as near as possible to the direction of the earth's magnetic force, but there will be no motion of the vessel as a whole in any direction; so that there can be no excess of the force towards the north over that towards the south, or the reverse. It may also be shewn from the fact that magnetizing a piece of steel does not alter its weight. It does alter the apparent position of its centre of gravity, causing it in these