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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 January 2013
It is familiarly known as one of the commonest experiments in optics that when a beam of polarised light is passed through a thin film of mica or selenite, and subsequently analysed either by reflection or by double refraction, two colours are seen complementary to one another, and alternating with one another at each 90° of a revolution of the analysing plate or prism.
page 178 note * A similar form of instrument will be found described in the “Quarterly Journal of Science” for October 1869.
page 178 note † The graduated rotatory stage above mentioned, and which is supplied by Smith and Beck, affords a ready means of doing this.
page 180 note * If the axis of the selenite makes a greater or less angle than 45° with the plane of polarisation, the result is that while the same band still recurs after 180° of a revolution of the analyser, the complementary band is no longer separated from it by 90°, but by a greater or less angle.
page 181 note * The effect of circularly polarising the light before it passes through the selenite, is simply that the occurrence of the hands is irrespective of the inclination of the axis of the selenite to the plane of primitive polarisation, and depends solely on the position of the analyser.
page 182 note * See Note on p. 180.