pendulum, now, can be thrown into violent vibration in two ways; either by a single heavy impulse, or by a number of properly communicated slight impulses. For example, we impart to the pendulum, while at rest in its position of equilibrium, a very slight impulse. It will execute a very small vibration. As it passes a third time its position of equilibrium, a second having elapsed, we impart to it again a slight shock, in the same direction with the first. Again after the lapse of a second, on its fifth passage through the position of equilibrium, we strike it again in the same manner; and so continue. You see, by this process the shocks imparted augment continually the motion of the pendulum. After each slight impulse, the pendulum reaches out a little further in its swing, and finally acquires a considerable motion.[8]
But this is not the case under all circumstances. It is possible only when the impulses imparted synchronise with the swings of the pendulum. If we should communicate the second impulse at the end of half a second and in the same direction with the first impulse, its effects would counteract the motion of the pendulum. It is easily seen that our little impulses help the motion of the pendulum more and more, according as their time accords with the time of the pendulum. If we strike the pendulum in any other time than in that of its vibration, in some instances, it is true, we shall augment its vibration, but in others again, we shall obstruct it. Our impulses will be less effective the more the motion of our own hand departs from the motion of the pendulum.
What is true of the pendulum holds true of every vibrating body. A tuning-fork when it sounds, also vibrates. It vibrates more rapidly when its sound is higher; more slowly when it is deeper. The standard A of our musical scale is produced by about four hundred and fifty vibrations in a second.
I place by the side of each other on this table two tuning-forks, exactly alike, resting on resonant cases. I strike the first one a sharp blow, so that it emits a loud note, and immediately grasp it again with my hand to quench its note. Nevertheless, you still hear the note distinctly sounded, and by feeling it you may convince yourselves that the other fork which was not struck now vibrates.
I now attach a small bit of wax to one of the forks. It is thrown thus out of tune; its note is made a little deeper. I now repeat the same experiment with the two forks, now of unequal pitch, by striking one of them and again grasping it with my hand; but in the present case the note ceases the very instant I touch the fork.
What has happened here in these two experiments? Simply this. The vibrating fork imparts to the air and to the table four hundred and fifty shocks a second, which are carried over to the other fork. If the other fork is pitched to the same note, that is to say, if it vibrates when struck in the same time with the first, then the shocks first emitted, no matter how slight they may be, are sufficient to throw the second fork into rapid sympathetic vibration. But when the time of vibration of the two forks is slightly different, this does not take place. We may strike as many forks as we will, the fork tuned to A is perfectly indifferent to their notes; is deaf, in fact, to all except its own; and if you strike three, or four, or five, or any number whatsoever, of forks all at the same time, so as to make the shocks which come from them ever so great, the A fork will not join in with their vibrations unless another fork A is found in the collection struck. It picks out, in other words, from all the notes sounded, that which accords with it.
The same is true of all bodies which can yield notes. Tumblers resound when a piano is played, on the striking of certain notes, and so do window panes. Nor is the phenomenon without analogy in other provinces. Take a dog that answers to the name "Nero." He lies under your table. You speak of Domitian, Vespasian, and Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, you call upon all the names of the Roman Emperors that occur to you, but the dog does not stir, although a slight tremor of his ear tells you of a faint response of his consciousness. But the moment you call "Nero" he jumps joyfully towards you. The tuning-fork is like your dog. It answers to the name A.
You smile, ladies. You shake your heads. The simile does not catch your fancy. But I have another, which is very near to you: and for punishment you shall hear it. You, too, are like tuning-forks. Many are the hearts that throb with ardor for you, of which you take no notice, but are cold. Yet what does it profit you! Soon the heart will come that beats in just the proper rhythm, and then your knell, too, has struck. Then your heart, too, will beat in unison, whether you will or no.
The law of sympathetic vibration, here propounded for sounding bodies, suffers some modification for bodies incompetent to yield notes. Bodies of this kind vibrate to almost every note. A high silk hat, we know, will not sound; but if you will hold your hat in your hand when attending your next concert you will not only hear the pieces played, but also feel them with your fingers. It is exactly so with men. People who are themselves able to give tone to their surroundings, bother little about the prattle of others. But the person without character tarries everywhere: in the temperance hall, and at the bar of the public-house—everywhere where a committee is formed. The high silk hat is among bells what the weakling is among men of conviction.
A sonorous body, therefore, always sounds when its special note, either alone or in company with others, is struck. We may now go a step further. What will be the behaviour of a group of sonorous bodies which in the pitch of their notes form a scale? Let us picture to ourselves, for example (Fig. 8), a series of rods or strings pitched to the notes c d e f g. … On a musical instrument the accord c e g is struck. Every one of the rods of Fig. 8 will see if its special note is contained in the accord, and if it finds it, it will respond. The rod c will give at once the note c, the rod e the note e, the rod g the note g. All the other rods will remain at rest, will not sound.
We need not look about us long for such an instrument. Every piano is an instrument of this kind, with which the experiment mentioned may be executed with splendid success. Two pianos stand here by the side of each other, both tuned alike. We will employ the first for exciting the notes, while we will allow the second to respond; after having first pressed upon the loud pedal, so as to render all the strings capable of motion.
Every harmony struck with vigor on the first piano is distinctly repeated on the second. To prove that it is the same strings that are sounded in both pianos, we repeat the experiment in a slightly changed form. We let go the loud pedal of the second piano and pressing on the keys c e g of that instrument vigorously strike the harmony c e g on the first piano. The harmony c e g is now also sounded on the second piano. But if we press only on one key g of one piano, while we strike c e g on the other, only g will be sounded on the second. It is thus always the like strings of the two pianos that excite each other.
The piano can reproduce any sound that is composed of its musical notes. It will reproduce, for example, very distinctly, a vowel sound that is sung into it. And in truth physics has proved that the vowels may be regarded as composed of simple musical notes.
You see that by the exciting of definite tones in the air quite definite motions are set up with mechanical necessity in the piano. The idea might be made use of for the performance of some pretty pieces of wizardry. Imagine a box in which is a stretched string of definite pitch. This is thrown into motion as often as its note is sung or whistled. Now it would not be a very difficult task for a skilful mechanic to so construct the box that the vibrating cord would close a galvanic circuit and open the lock. And it would not be a much more difficult task to construct a box which would open at the whistling of a certain melody. Sesame! and the bolts fall. Truly, we should have here a veritable puzzle-lock. Still another fragment rescued from that old kingdom of fables, of which our day has realised so much, that world of fairy-stories to which the latest contributions are Casselli's telegraph, by which one can write at a distance in one's own hand, and Prof. Elisha Gray's telautograph. What would the good old Herodotus have said to these things who even
