Page:Light waves and their uses.djvu/176

158 The problem was practically solved by reflecting part of the light back and forth a number of times and then returning it to its starting-point. The other path was at right angles to the first, and over it the light made a similar series of excursions, and was also reflected back to the starting-point. This starting-point was a separating plane in an interferometer, and the two paths at right angles were the two arms of an interferometer. Notwithstanding the very considerable difference in path, which must involve an exceedingly high order of accuracy in the reflecting surfaces and a constancy of temperature in the air between, it was possible to see fringes and to keep them in position for several hours at a time.

These conditions having been fulfilled, the apparatus was mounted on a stone support, about four feet square and one foot thick, and this stone was mounted on a circular disc of wood which floated in a tank of mercury. The resistance to motion is thus exceedingly small, so that by a very slight pressure on the circumference the whole could be kept in slow and continuous rotation. It would take, perhaps, five minutes to make one single turn. With this slight motion there is practically no oscillation; the observer has to follow around and at intervals to observe whether there is any displacement of the fringes.

It was found that there was no displacement of the interference fringes, so that the result of the experiment was negative and would, therefore, show that there is still a difficulty in the theory itself; and this difficulty, I may say, has not yet been satisfactorily explained. I am presenting the case, not so much for solution, but as an illustration of the applicability of light waves to new problems.

The actual arrangement of the experiment is shown in Fig. 107. A lens makes the rays nearly parallel. The dividing surface and the two paths are easily recognized. The telescope was furnished with a micrometer screw to determine