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If a brown tourmaline, which is a mineral generally crystallized in the form of a long prism, be cut longitudinally, that is, parallel to the axis of the prism, into plates about the thirtieth of an inch in thickness, and the surfaces polished, luminous objects may be seen through them, as through plates of colored glass. The axis of each plate is, in its longitudinal section, parallel to the axis of the prism whence it was cut. If one of these plates be held perpendicularly between the eye and a candle, and turned slowly round in its own plane, no change will take place in the image of the candle; but if the plate be held in a fixed position, with its axis or longitudinal section vertical, when a second plate is interposed between it and the eye, parallel to the first, and turned slowly round in its own plane, a remarkable change will be found to have taken place in the nature of the light, for the image of the candle will vanish and appear alternately at every quarter revolution of the plate, varying through all degrees of brightness down to total, or almost total, evanescence, and then increasing again by the same degrees as it had before decreased. These changes depend upon the relative positions of the plates. When the longitudinal sections of the two plates are parallel, the brightness of the image is at its maximum; and when the axes of the sections cross at right angles, the image of the candle vanishes. Thus the light, in passing through the first plate of tourmaline, has acquired a property totally different from the direct light of the candle. The direct light would have penetrated the second plate equally well in all directions, whereas the refracted ray will only pass through it in particular positions, and is altogether incapable of penetrating it in others. The refracted ray is polarized in its passage

through the first tourmaline, and experience shows that it never loses that property, unless when acted upon by a new substance. Thus one of the properties of polarized light is proved to be the incapability of passing through a plate of tourmaline perpendicular to it, in certain positions, and its ready transmission in other positions at right angles to the former.

Many other substances. have the property of polarizing light. If a ray of light falls upon a transparent medium which has the same temperature, density and structure throughout every part, as fluids, gases, glass, &c., and a few regularly crystallized minerals, it is refracted into a single pencil of light by the laws of ordinary refraction, according to which the ray, passing through the refracting surface from the object to the eye, never quits a plane perpendicular to that surface. Almost all other bodies, such as the greater number of crystallized minerals, animal and vegetable substances, gums, resins, jellies, and all solid bodies having unequal tensions, whether from unequal temperature or pressure, possess the property of doubling the image or appearance of an object seen through them in certain directions; because a ray of natural light falling upon them is refracted into two pencils which move with different velocities, and are more or less separated, according to the nature of the body and the direction of the incident ray. Iceland spar, a carbonate of lime, which, by its natural cleavage, may be split into the form of a rhombohedron, possesses this property in an eminent degree, as may be seen by pasting a piece of paper, with a large pin hole in it, on the side of the spar farthest from the eye. The hole will appear double when held to the light. One of these pencils is refracted according to the

same law, as in glass or water, never quitting the plane perpendicular to the refracting surface, and therefore called the ordinary ray; but the other does quit that plane, being refracted according to a different and much more complicated law, and on that account is called the extraordinary ray. For the same reason one image is called the ordinary, and the other the extraordinary image. When the spar is turned round in the same plane, the extraordinary image of the hole revolves about the ordinary image which remains fixed, both being equally bright. But if the spar be kept in one position, and viewed through a plate of tourmaline, it will be found that, as the tourmaline revolves, the images vary in their relative brightness-one increases in intensity till it arrives at a maximum, at the same time that the other diminishes till it vanishes, and so on alternately at each quarter revolution, proving both rays to be polarized; for in one position the tourmaline transmits the ordinary ray, and reflects the extraordinary, and after revolving 90°, the extraordinary ray is transmitted, and the ordinary ray is reflected. Thus another property of polarized light is, that it cannot be divided into two equal pencils by double refraction, in positions of the doubly refracting bodies, in which a ray of common light would be so divided.

Were tourmaline like other doubly refracting bodies, each of the transmitted rays would be double, but that mineral, when of a certain thickness, after separating the light into two polarized pencils, absorbs one of them, und consequently shows only one image of an object.

The pencils of light, on leaving a doubly refracting substance, are parallel; and it is clear, from the preceding experiments, that they are polarized in planes at right an

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gles to each other. But that will be better understood by considering the change produced in common light by the action of the polarizing body. It has been shown that the undulations of ether, which produce the sensation of common light, are performed in every possible plane, at right angles to the direction in which the ray is moving; but the case is very different after the ray has passed through a doubly refracting substance, like Iceland spar. The light then proceeds in two parallel pencils, whose undulations are still, indeed, transverse to the direction of the rays, but they are accomplished in planes at right angles to one another, analogous to two parallel stretched cords, one of which performs its undulations only in a horizontal plane, and the other in a vertical, or upright plane. Thus the polarizing action of Iceland spar, and of all doubly refracting substances, is, to separate a ray of common light whose waves, or undulations, are in every plane, into two parallel rays, whose waves or undulations lie in planes at right angles to each other. The ray of common light may be assimilated to a round rod, whereas the two polarized rays are like two parallel long flat rulers, one of which is laid horizontally on its broad surface, and the other horizontally on its edge. The alternate transmission and obstruction of one of these flattened beams by the tourmaline is similar to the facility with which a thin sheet of paper, or a card, may be passed between the bars of a grating, or wires of a cage, if presented edgeways, and the impossibility of its passing in a direction transverse to the openings of the bars or wires.

Although it generally happens that a ray of light, in passing through Iceland spar, is separated into two polarized rays; yet there is one direction along which it is re

fracted in one ray only, and that according to the ordinary law. This direction is called the optic axis. Many crystals and other substances have two optic axes, inclined to each other, along which a ray of light is transmitted in one pencil by the law of ordinary refraction. The extraordinary ray is sometimes refracted towards the optic axis, as in quartz, zircon, ice, &c., which are, therefore, said to be positive crystals; but when it is bent from the optic axis, as in Iceland spar, tourmaline, emerald, beryl, &c., the crystals are negative, which is the most numerous class. The ordinary ray moves with uniform velocity within a doubly refracting substance, but the velocity of the extraordinary ray varies with the position of the ray relatively to the optic axis, being a maximum when its motion within the crystal is at right angles to the optic axis, and a minimum when parallel to it. Between these extremes its velocity varies according to a determinate law.

It had been inferred from the action of Iceland spar on light, that, in all doubly refracting substances, one only of the two rays is turned aside from the plane of ordinary refraction, while the other follows the ordinary law; and the great difficulty of observing the phenomena tended to confirm that opinion. M. Fresnel, however, proved, by a most profound mathematical inquiry, a priori, that the extraordinary ray must be wanting in glass and other uncrystallized substances, and that it must necessarily exist in carbonate of lime, quartz, and other bodies having one optic axis, but that, in the numerous class of substances which possess two optic axes, both rays must undergo extraordinary refraction, and consequently that both must deviate from their original plane, and these results have

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