Page:A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism - Volume 2.djvu/433

Rh of polarization is made to rotate is the same as the direction in which a positive current must circulate round the ray in order to produce a magnetic force in the same direction as that which actually exists in the medium.

Verdet, however, discovered that in certain ferromagnetic media, as, for instance, a strong solution of perchloride of iron in wood-spirit or ether, the rotation is in the opposite direction to the current which would produce the magnetic force.

This shews that the difference between ferromagnetic and diamagnetic substances does not arise merely from the 'magnetic permeability' being in the first case greater, and in the second less, than that of air, but that the properties of the two classes of bodies are really opposite.

The power acquired by a substance under the action of magnetic force of rotating the plane of polarization of light is not exactly proportional to its diamagnetic or ferromagnetic magnetizability. Indeed there are exceptions to the rule that the rotation is positive for diamagnetic and negative for ferromagnetic substances, for neutral chromate of potash is diamagnetic, but produces a negative rotation.

810.] There are other substances, which, independently of the application of magnetic force, cause the plane of polarization to turn to the right or to the left, as the ray travels through the substance. In some of these the property is related to an axis, as in the case of quartz. In others, the property is independent of the direction of the ray within the medium, as in turpentine, solution of sugar, &c. In all these substances, however, if the plane of polarization of any ray is twisted within the medium like a right-handed screw, it will still be twisted like a right-handed screw if the ray is transmitted through the medium in the opposite direction. The direction in which the observer has to turn his analyser in order to extinguish the ray after introducing the medium into its path, is the same with reference to the observer whether the ray comes to him from the north or from the south. The direction of the rotation in space is of course reversed when the direction of the ray is reversed. But when the rotation is produced by magnetic action, its direction in space is the same whether the ray be travelling north or south. The rotation is always in the same direction as that of the electric current which produces, or would produce, the actual magnetic state of the field, if the medium belongs to the positive class, or in the opposite direction if the medium belongs to the negative class.