Note 1 — Chapter XIX · LATENT FORCE IN INTERSTITIAL SPACES—ELECTRO-MAGNETIC RADIATION—MOLECULAR DISSOCIATION.

There are some paradoxical conditions shown up in the disintegration of water which require further research to get at the solution. In disintegrating, say five drops of water in a steel bulb of two cubic inches volume of atmospheric air, the force generated by the triple order of vibration, when weighed on a lever, shows ten tons pressure per square inch. In using the same number of drops in the same bulb, and associating it with a tube of two hundred cubic inches, the result is the same in the force developed per square inch as is shown on the volume of the one of two cubic inches. The solution of this problem seems to rest in the fact that the gaseous element thereby induced even in minute quantities, must possess the property of exciting atmospheric air to that extent as to force it to give up, to quite an extended degree, the latent energy that is held in its corpuscular depths. This introductory medium seems to act on the air in the same manner that a spark of fire acts on a magazine of gunpowder. ↑