They resemble loaded
piano strings, or slowly descending water jets, requiring notes of low
pitch to set them in motion.
The influence of synchronism between the "radiant" and the "absorbent"
is well shown by the behavior of carbonic acid gas. To the complex
emission from our heated stove, carbonic acid would be one of the most
transparent of gases. For such waves olefiant gas, for example, would
vastly transcend it in absorbing power. But when we select a radiant
with whose waves the atoms of carbonic acid are in accord, the case is
entirely altered. Such a radiant is found in a carbonic oxide flame,
where the radiating body is really hot carbonic acid. To this special
radiation carbonic acid is the most opaque of gases.
And here we find ourselves face to face with a question of great
delicacy and importance. Both as a radiator and as an absorber, carbonic
acid is, in general, a feeble gas. It is beaten in this respect by
chloride of methyl, ethylene, ammonia, sulphurous acid, nitrous oxide,
and marsh gas. Compared with some of these gases, its behavior, in fact,
approaches that of elementary bodies. May it not help to explain their
neutrality? The doctrine is now very generally accepted that atoms of
the same kind may, like atoms of different kinds, group themselves to
molecules. Affinity exists between hydrogen and hydrogen and between
chlorine and chlorine, as well as between hydrogen and chlorine.
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