Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 63.djvu/109

Rh the form of one line of electric strain round a linear oscillator, with spark gap in the center, one half being charged positively and the other negatively. Let us then suppose that the insulation of the spark gap is destroyed, so that the opposite electric charges rush together and oscillate to and fro. The strain lines at each oscillation are then crossed or decussate, and the result, as shown in Fig. 2, d, is that a portion of the energy of the field is thrown off in the form of self-closed lines of strain (see Fig. 2, e). At each oscillation of the charges the direction of the lines of strain springing from end to end of the radiator is reversed. It is a general property of lines of strain, whether electric or magnetic, that there is a tension along the line and a pressure at right angles. In other words, these lines of electric strain are like elastic threads, they tend to contract in the direction of their length and press sideways on each other when in the same direction. Hence it is not difficult to see that as each batch of self-closed lines of strain is thrown off, the direction of the strain round each loop is alternately in one direction and in the other. Hence these loops of electric strain press each other out, and each one that is formed squeezes the already formed loops further and further from the radiator. The loops, therefore, march away into space (see Fig. 2, f). If we imagine ourselves standing at a little distance at a point on the equatorial line and able to see these loops of strain as they pass, we should recognize a procession of loops, consisting of alternately directed strain lines marching past. This movement through the ether of self-closed lines of electric strain constitutes what is called electric radiation.

Hence along a line drawn perpendicular to the radiator through its center, there is a distribution of electric strain normal to that line, which is periodic in space and in time. Moreover, in addition to these lines of electric strain, there are at right angles to them another set of self-closed lines of magnetic flux. Alternated between the instants when the electric charges at the ends of the radiator are at their maximum, we have instants when the radiator rod is the seat of an electric current, and hence the field round it is filled with circular lines of magnetic flux coaxial with the radiator. As the current alternates in direction each half period, these rings of magnetic flux alternate in direction as regards the flux, and hence we must complete our mental picture of the space round the radiator rods when the charges are oscillating by supposing it filled with concentric rings of magnetic flux which are periodically reversed in direction, and have their maximum values at those instants and places where the lines of electric strain have their zero values. Accordingly, along the equatorial line we have two sets of strains in the ether, distributed periodically in space and in time. First, the lines of electric strain