Smithsonian Miscellaneous Collections, Volume 20Smithsonian Institution, 1881 |
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ABBE ABSTRACT American angle annual ANTISELL appear ASAPH HALL astronomical axis battery Chair character CLEVELAND ABBE coil coin coinage Committee communication determined diameter direction distance E. B. ELLIOTT earth EDGAR FRISBY effect electricity exhibited experiments fact feet G. K. GILBERT galvanic galvanometer geological GILL gold inches induction investigation J. E. HILGARD J. J. WOODWARD January JOSEPH HENRY light magnet Malfatti's Problem means MEETING members and visitors memoir ment Messrs metals meteor meteorological miles mountain nature nearly NEWCOMB object observations obtained phenomena Phil PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY pinnules planet portion POWELL President produced Prof published read a paper referred Remarks river satellite scientific SIMON NEWCOMB Smithsonian Institution Smithsonian Report SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON sound species surface temperature THEODORE GILL tion U. S. NAVAL OBSERVATORY Umbriel velocity Vice-President visitors present W. H. DALL wind wire zodiacal light
Popular passages
Page 196 - The special committee reported the following resolutions, which were unanimously adopted : Resolved, That in the death of...
Page 204 - We get no good By being ungenerous, even to a book, And calculating profits . . so much help By so much reading. It is rather when We gloriously forget ourselves, and plunge Soul-forward, headlong, into a book's profound, Impassioned for its beauty and salt of truth — 'Tis then we get the right good from a book.
Page 246 - But be this as it may," he concludes, "the fact that the magnetic action of a current from a trough is at least not sensibly diminished by passing through a long wire is directly applicable to Mr. Barlow's project of forming an electromagnetic telegraph ; and it is also of material consequence in the construction of the galvanic coil.
Page 252 - If a wire, connected at both extremities with a galvanometer, be coiled in the form of a helix around a magnet, no current of electricity takes place in it. This is an experiment which has been made by various persons hundreds of times, in the hope of evolving electricity from magnetism, and...
Page 245 - In a very early stage of electro-magnetic experiments it had been suggested that an instantaneous telegraph might be established by means of conducting wires and compasses. The details of this contrivance are so obvious, and the principle on which it is founded so well understood, that there was only one question which could render the result doubtful ; and this was, — is there any diminution of effect by lengthening the conducting wire?
Page 255 - ... when a small battery is moderately excited by diluted acid, and its poles which should be terminated by cups of mercury, are connected by a copper wire not more than a foot in length, no spark is perceived when the connection is either formed or broken ; but if a wire thirty or forty feet long be used instead of the short wire, though no spark will be perceptible when the connection is made, yet when it is broken by drawing one end of the wire from its cup of mercury, a vivid spark is produced.
Page 225 - I had rather believe all the fables in the legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a mind; and, therefore, God never wrought miracle to convince atheism, because his ordinary works convince it.
Page 295 - Another subject of research mentioned in the programme, and which 1ms been urged upon the immediate attention of the Institution, is that of an extensive system of meteorological observations, particularly with reference to the phenomena of American storms. Of late years in our country more additions have been made to meteorology than to any other branch of physical science. Several important generalizations have been arrived at, and definite theories proposed, which now enable us to direct our attention...
Page 331 - ... vertical axis of the cube. After this important fact was clearly determined, lead and all other interposed substances were discarded, and a method devised by which the upper and lower surfaces of the cube could be ground into perfect parallelism. - - - All the specimens tested were subjected to this process, and on their exposure to pressure were found to give concordant results. The crushing force sustained was therefore much greater than that heretofore given for the same material." * In the...
Page 254 - ... the poles of the magnet were connected by a single rod of iron, bent into the form of a horse-shoe, and its extremities filed perfectly flat so as to come in perfect contact with the faces of the poles; around the middle of the arch of this horse-shoe, two strands of copper wire were tightly coiled one over the other. A current from one of these helices deflected the needle one hundred degrees, and when both were used the needle was deflected with such force as to make a complete circuit. But...