Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose | Page 3

had been predicted by Clerk Maxwell long before. This great discovery sent a reverberation through the gallery of the scientific world. And, at once, the scientists in all countries began to devote their best energies to explorations in this new Realm of Nature. Young J. C. Bose--who had drunk deep at the springs of Scientific Knowledge and whose imagination had been very deeply touched by the scientific activities of the West and who had in him the burning desire that India should 'enter the world movement for that advancement of knowledge'--also followed suit.
DIFFICULTIES OF RESEARCHES
When, however, Prof. J. C. Bose joined the Presidency College, there was no laboratory worth the name there, nor had he any of 'those mechanical facilities at his disposal which every prominent European and American experimental scientist commands'. He had to work under discouraging difficulties before he could begin his investigations. He was, however, not a man to quarrel with circumstances. He bravely accepted them and began to work in his own private laboratory and with appliances which, in any other country, would be deemed inadequate. He applied himself closely to the investigation of the invisible etheric waves and, with the simple means at his command, accomplished things, which few were able to perform in spite of their great wealth of external appliances.
As the wave-length of a Hertzian (electric) ray was very large--about 3 metres[8] long--compared with that of visible light, considerable difficulties were experienced in carrying on experiments with the same. It was thought, for instance, that very large crystals, much larger than what occur in nature, would be required to show the polarisation of electric ray. Prof. Bose who 'combined in him the inventiveness of a resourceful engineer, with the penetration and imagination of a great scientist'--designed an instrument which generated very short electric waves with a length of about 6 millimetres or so. And, by working with Electric radiations having very short wave-lengths, he succeeded in demonstrating that the electric waves are polarised by the crystal Nemalite (which he himself discovered) in the very same way as a beam of light is polarised by the crystal Tourmaline. He then showed that a large number of substances, which are opaque to Light (e.g. pitch, coal-tar etc.) are transparent to Electric Waves. He next determined the Index of Refraction of various substances for invisible Electric Radiation and thereby eliminated a great difficulty which had presented itself in Maxwell's theory as to the relation between the index of refraction of light and the di-electric constant of insulators. He then determined the wave length of Electric Radiation as produced by various oscillators.
HIS EARLY CONTRIBUTIONS AND THEIR APPRECIATIONS
His first contribution was 'On Polarisation of Electric Rays by Double Refracting Crystals.' It was read at a meeting of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, held on the 1st May 1895, and was published in the Journal of the Society in Vol. LXIV,
Part II, page 291. His next contributions were
'On a new Electro polariscope' and 'On the Double Refraction of the Electric Ray by a Strained Di-electric.' They appeared, in the Electrician, the leading journal on Electricity, published in London. These 'strikingly original researches' won the attention of the scientific world. Lord Kelvin, the greatest physicist of the age, declared himself 'literally filled with wonder and admiration for so much success in the novel and difficult problem which he had attacked.' Lord Rayleigh communicated the results of his remarkable researches to the Royal Society. And the Royal Society showed its appreciation of the high scientific value of his investigation, not only, by the publication, with high tributes, of a paper of his 'On the Determination of the Indices of Electric Refraction,' in December 1896, and another paper on the 'Determination of the Wave-length of Electric Radiation,' in June 1896, but also, by the offer, of their own accord, of an appropriation from the Special Parliamentary Grant made to the Society for the Advancement of Knowledge, for continuation of his work.
In recognition of the importance of the contribution made by Prof. Bose, the University of London conferred on him the Degree of Doctor of Science and the Cambridge University, the degree of M.A., in 1896. And, to crown all, the Royal Institution of Great Britain--rendered famous by the labour of Davy and Faraday, of Rayleigh and Dewar--honoured him by inviting to deliver a 'Friday Evening Discourse' on his original work. It would not be out of place to observe that the rare privilege of being invited to deliver a 'Friday Evening Discourse' is regarded as one of the highest distinction that can be conferred on a scientific man.
HIS FIRST SCIENTIFIC DEPUTATION. (1896-97)
The Government of India showed its appreciation of his work by deputing him to Europe to place the results of his investigations before the learned Scientific Bodies. He remained on his