Page:Electricity (1912) Kapp.djvu/98

94 the end pointing to the sphere will become negatively and the other end positively electrified. The question is, how strongly? Obviously it is a matter of conflicting forces. The left end of the cylinder contains positive and the right end negative electricity. If the sphere were taken away, the attraction between the two charges would cause them immediately to flow together, and, neutralising each other, the cylinder would again appear uncharged, as it was before we approached it to the sphere. There is thus a separating force due to the sphere, and a uniting force due to the mutual action of the two ends acting simultaneously, and the result is that the quantity of charge which can be accumulated on each end of the cylinder is not unlimited.

Now let us touch the cylinder with the finger. The negative charge has no desire to flow away through our body to earth, for it is attracted by the charge of the sphere, but the positive charge of the cylinder is pushed away by the action of the tubes of force and will flow as far as it can. Before the cylinder was touched it went to the farthest point, namely, the left-hand end of the cylinder, but the moment we touch it we give it a path to flow much farther, namely, through our body to