Page:Experimental researches in chemistry and.djvu/410

1857.] In this manner the leaf may be obtained so thin, that I think 50 or even 100 might be included in a single progressive undulation of light. But the character of the effect on light is not changed, the light transmitted is green, as before; and though that green tint is due to a condition of the gold induced by pressure, it as yet remains unchanged through all these varieties of thickness and of proportion to the progressive or the lateral undulation.

Gold-leaf either fine or common, examined in the microscope, appears as a most irregular thing. It is everywhere closely mottled or striated, according as a part at the middle or the edge of a leaf is selected, minute portions which are close to other parts being four or five times as thick as the latter, if the proportion of light which passes through may be accepted as an indication. Yet this irregular plate does not cause any sensible distortion of an object seen through it, that object being the line of light reflected from a fine wire in the focus of a moderate microscope. Nor perhaps was any distortion due to consecutive convexities and concavities to be expected; for when the thicker parts of the leaf were examined they seemed to be accumulated plications of the gold, the leaf appearing as a most irregular and crumpled object, with dark veins running across both the thicker and thinner parts, and from one to the other. Yet in the best microscope, and with the highest power, the leaf seemed to be continuous, the occurrence of the smallest sensible hole making that continuity at other parts apparent, and every part possessing its proper green colour. How such a film can act as a plate on polarized light in the manner it does, is one of the queries suggested by the phenomena which requires solution.

When gold-leaf is laid upon glass and its temperature raised considerably without disturbance, either by the blowpipe or an ordinary Argand gas-burner, it seems to disappear, i. e. the lustre passes away, the light transmitted is abundant and nearly white, and the place appears of a pale brown colour. One would think that much of the metal was dissipated, but all is there, and if the heat has been very high (which is not necessaryfor the best results), the microscope shows it in minute