Lives of the electricians

by William T. Jeans

In 1871 Mr. Spottiswoode delivered a lecture at the Royal Institution on “Some experiments on successive polarisation of light made by Sir Charles Wheatstone.” He explained that the experiments then described were made by Wheatstone some years previously, but the pressure of other avocations delayed their publication. Certain it is that the polarisation of light formed the subject of experiments twenty-five years previously, for in 1848 Professor Wheatstone described to the British Association an apparatus which by means of the polarisation of light indicated true solar time in places where a sun-dial would be useless. It was called Wheatstone’s polar clock or dial, and he described several forms of it.

It would be tedious to enumerate all his minor inventions; but it is worthy of observation that from first to last there was a remarkable periodicity in the production of his chief inventions. Beginning with his magic lyre in 1821, he invented the concertina in 1829,[8] and his first telegraph in 1837. Between 1837 and 1843 he produced eight inventions; and after that period his next notable inventions were his pseudoscope and his novel apparatus illustrating the rotation of the earth in 1851. In 1858 he produced his automatic transmitter, which was succeeded in 1867 by his dynamo. It thus appears that a period of eight years elapsed between each of these important inventions, with the single exception of the interval from 1837 to 1843, when he produced eight inventions. This periodic ripening of his fertile mind into a rich harvest of inventions extended over half a century. It need scarcely be matter of surprise, therefore, that when death put a stop to his labours on the eve of another cycle, he left evidences of fresh fruits which were not yet matured. His last invention was a new recording instrument for submarine cables. It consisted of a globe of mercury which a slight electrical impulse caused to move to and fro in a capillary tube containing acid, the movements of the globule to the right or left by the delicate current of a cable representing telegraphic signs. It was said at the time to be fifty-eight times more sensitive than any previous recorder.

“The catalogue of Wheatstone’s valuable labours,” says a friend of his, “is still far from being exhausted: but it must now suffice only to mention some of his unpublished and incomplete researches, of which many exist. At the early part of his career, when his thoughts were mainly directed to Acoustics, he endeavoured to investigate the causes of the differences of ‘timbre’ or quality of tone in different musical instruments, presuming it to depend on the nature of superposed secondary vibrations, and of the material by which they are affected. This the writer frequently, but in vain, urged him to complete and publish; but such was the fecundity of his imagination that he would frequently work steadily for a time at a given subject, and then entirely put it aside in pursuit, it may be, of some more important or more practical idea that had presented itself to his mind. A short treatise is in existence on the capabilities of his well-known wave-machine, in which rows of white balls, mounted on rods, are actuated in two directions perpendicular to each other by guides or templets with suitable curved outlines; by means of this machine many combinations of plane and helical waves may be demonstrated, and especially those related to the theory of polarised light.

“In furtherance of this subject he devised a new form or mode of geometrical analysis, to which he gave the title of Bifarial Algebra, in which both the magnitude and the relative position of lines on a plane surface are designed to be represented by the introduction of two new symbols to represent positive and negative perpendicular directions. The same principle has also been extended to three dimensions, with a further proposal of new symbols, under the name of Trifarial Algebra. On this subject a brief treatise exists in manuscript.

“Among the subjects of his more recent but still incomplete investigations in light and electricity, the following may be mentioned:—colours of transparent and opaque bodies; colours obtained by transmission and reflection; absorption-bands in coloured liquids; spectroscopic examination of light reflected from opaque and dichroic bodies; electro-motive forces of various combinations; inductive capacities of various bodies; experiments on electro-capillarity; and the construction of relays.”

“Although any one would be charmed by his able and lucid exposition of any scientific fact or principle in private, yet his attempt to repeat the same process in public invariably proved unsatisfactory. An anecdote may here be mentioned in confirmation of this peculiar idiosyncrasy. Wheatstone and the writer of this were for several years members of a small private debating society comprising several familiar names in science, art, or literature, that met periodically at one another’s houses to discuss some extemporaneous subject, and every member was expected to speak. Wheatstone never could be induced to open his lips, even on subjects on which he was brimful of information.”

His familiar form, says Mr. W. H. Preece, was well known to the old habitués of the Royal Institution. “Whenever either of his favourite subjects, light, sound, or electricity, was under discussion, his little, active, nervous, and intelligent form was present, eagerly listening to the lecturer. He was no lecturer himself, yet no one was more voluble in conversation. In explaining any object of his own invention, or any apparatus before him, no one was more apt, but when he appeared before an audience and became the focus of a thousand eyes, all his volubility fled; and left him without a particle of that peculiar quality which enables an individual with confidence to come before a critical audience, such as is represented by the members of the Royal Institution, to develop scientific facts or describe apparatus. This defect proved fortunate, for it was the cause of Wheatstone obtaining the aid of the greatest lecturer of the age; and the annals of that Institution bear record of many Friday evenings being occupied by Faraday in expounding the ‘beautiful developments,’ as he called them, of Wheatstone.... Though he was no lecturer, or prolific writer, he was an unrivalled conversationalist, and those who had the pleasure of his conversation could never forget the lucidity with which he explained his apparatus. His bibliographical knowledge was almost incredible. He seemed to know every book that was written and every fact recorded, and any one in doubt had only to go to Wheatstone to get what he wanted. The elegance of the design of everything Wheatstone accomplished must always maintain him in the very first rank of the wonderful geniuses of this wonderful century.”

Many honours and distinctions were conferred on him. He received the degrees of D.C.L. and LL.D. from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and he was made a corresponding or honorary member of all the principal scientific academies in Europe. Of the thirty-four distinctions conferred on him by Governments, Universities, or learned Societies, eight were German, six French, five English, three Swiss, two Scotch, two Italian, two American, besides one Irish, Swedish, Russian, Belgian, Dutch, and Brazilian. Most of his honours were conferred in recognition of his electrical inventions. For these he was knighted in 1868; and both before and after that date he was more lavishly praised abroad than at home. In 1867, the President of the Italian Society of Sciences, in conferring on him the honour of honorary membership, said that the applications of the principle of the Rotating Mirror were so important and so various that this discovery must be considered as one of those which have most contributed in these latter times to the progress of experimental physics. “The memoir on the measure of electric currents and all questions which relate thereto and to the laws of Ohm has powerfully contributed to spread among physicists the knowledge of these facts and the mode of measuring them with an accuracy and simplicity which before we did not possess. All physicists know how many researches have since been undertaken with the rheostat and with the so-called ‘Wheatstone Bridge,’ and how usefully these instruments have been applied to the measurement of electric currents, of the resistance of circuits, and of electro-motive forces.”

In 1873 the French Society for the Encouragement of National Industry presented him with the great medal of Ampère which is awarded every six years for what is considered the most important application of science to industry. The former recipients of this medal were Henri St. Claire Deville, who introduced the manufacture of aluminium; Ferdinand De Lesseps, the engineer of the Suez Canal; and Boussingault, the distinguished agricultural chemist. Of Sir Charles Wheatstone, the Committee of Economic Arts said: “While his kaleidophone has been the point of departure in a method which permits sound to be studied by the aid of the eye; while his researches on the qualities of sound and on the production of vowels, as well as the creation of his speaking machine have realised many points in the theory of the voice; while his ingenious apparatus illustrating the propagation and the combination of waves has facilitated the understanding of these delicate phenomena and contributed to throw light on the mechanism of undulatory motion, his numerous researches on the application of electricity, in which he has shown both profound science and a genius marvellously inspired, occupy a great place in the history of the electric telegraph. It was he who first realised, under conditions really practicable, this admirable means of communication between men and between nations, and we ought not to forget that more than once he has come personally among us to prepare its organisation and promote its success. The unanimous choice made by the Committee of the Economic Arts, and cordially ratified by the Council, honours our society as much as him who is the object of it. We hope to give on this occasion a testimony of sympathy with a nation in which science is held in such high esteem. In conferring on Sir Charles Wheatstone a reward rendered valuable by those who have already received it, the Council performs a pure act of justice, and acquits, at least for some among us, a debt of gratitude.”

For many years he was a corresponding member of the French Academy of Sciences, and on June 30, 1873, he was elected a Foreign Associate in succession to Baron Liebig, deceased, and his election to this position, the highest honour which it was in the power of that body to bestow upon “a foreigner,” was almost unanimous.