Clerk Maxwell and Lord Kelvin being the other two, who especially
contributed to the fame of the Cambridge school of mathematical
physics in the middle of the 19th century. His original
work began about 1840, and from that date onwards the great
extent of his output was only less remarkable than the brilliance
of its quality. The Royal Society's catalogue of scientific
papers gives the titles of over a hundred memoirs by him published
down to 1883. Some of these are only brief notes,
others are short controversial or corrective statements, but many
are really long and elaborate treatises. In matter his work is
distinguished by a certain definiteness and finality, and even of
problems, which when he attacked them were scarcely thought
amenable to mathematical analysis, he has in many cases given
solutions which once and for all settle the main principles.
This result must be ascribed' to his extraordinary combination
of mathematical power with experimental skill, for with him,
from the time when about 1840 he fitted up some simple
physical apparatus in his rooms in Pembroke College, mathematics
and experiment ever went hand in hand, aiding and
checking each other. In scope his work covered a wide range
of physical inquiry, but, as Alfred Cornu remarked in his Rede
lecture of 1899, the greater part of it was concerned with waves
and the transformations imposed on them during their passage
through various media. His first published papers, which
appeared in 1842 and 1843, were on the steady motion of incompressible
fluids and some cases of fluid motion; these were
followed in 1845 by one on the friction of fluids in motion and
the equilibrium and motion of elastic solids, and in 1850 by
another on the effects of the internal friction of fluids on the
motion of pendulums. To the theory of sound he made several
contributions, including a discussion of the effect of wind on the
intensity of sound and an explanation of how the intensity is
influenced by the nature of the gas in which the sound is produced.
These inquiries together put the science of hydro-dynamics
on a new footing, and provided a key not only to the
explanation of many natural phenomena, such as the suspension
of clouds in air, and the subsidence of ripples and waves in
water, but also to the solution of practical problems, such as the
flow of water in rivers and channels, and the skin resistance of
ships. But perhaps his best-known researches are those which
deal with the undulatory theory of light. His optical work
began at an early period in his scientific career. His first papers
on the aberration of light appeared in 1845 and 1846, and were
followed in 1848 by one on the theory of certain bands seen in
the spectrum. In 1849 he published a long paper on the dynamical
theory of diffraction, in which he showed that the plane of
polarization must be perpendicular to the direction of vibration.
Two years later he discussed the colours of thick plates; and in
1852, in his famous paper on the change of refrangibility of light,
he described the phenomenon of fluorescence, as exhibited by
fluorspar and uranium glass, materials which he viewed as
having the power to convert invisible ultra-violet rays into rays
of lower periods which are visible. A mechanical model, illustrating
the dynamical principle of Stokes's explanation was shown
in 1883, during a lecture at the Royal Institution, by Lord Kelvin,
who said he had heard an account of it from Stokes many years
before, and had repeatedly but vainly begged him to publish it. In
the same year, 1852, there appeared the paper on the composition
and resolution of streams of polarized light from different sources,
and in 1853 an investigation of the metallic reflection exhibited
by certain non-metallic substances. About i860 he was engaged
in an inquiry on the intensity of light reflected from, or transmitted
through, a pile of plates; and in 1862 he prepared for the
British Association a valuable report on double refraction, which
marks a period in the history of the subject in England. A
paper on the long spectrum of the electric light bears the same
date, and was followed by an inquiry into the absorption spectrum
of blood. The discrimination of organic bodies by their
optical properties was treated in 1864; and later, in conjunction
with the Rev. W. Vernon Harcourt, he investigated the relation
between the chemical constitution and the optical properties
of various glasses, with reference to the conditions of transparency and the improvement of achromatic telescopes. A still
later paper connected with the construction of optical instruments
discussed the theoretical limits to the aperture of microscopical
objectives. In other departments of physics may be
mentioned his paper on the conduction of heat in crystals (1851)
and his inquiries in connexion with the radiometer; his explanation
of the light border frequently noticed in photographs just
outside the outline of a dark body seen against the sky (1883);
and, still later, his theory of the Rontgen rays, which he suggested
might be transverse waves travelling as innumerable solitary
waves, not in regular trains. Two long papers published in 1849—one
on attractions and Clairaut's theorem, and the other on
the variation of gravity at the surface of the earth—also demand
notice, as do his mathematical memoirs on the critical values
of the sums of periodic series (1847) and on the numerical calculation
of a class of definite integrals and infinite series (1850) and
his discussion of a differential equation relating to the breaking
of railway bridges (1849).
But large as is the tale of Stokes's published work, it by no means represents the whole of his services in the advancement of science. Many of his discoveries were not published, or at least were only touched upon in the course of his oral lectures. An excellent instance is afforded by his work in the theory of spectrum analysis. In his presidential address to the British Association in 1871, Lord Kelvin (Sir William Thomson, as he was then) stated his belief that the application of the prismatic analysis of light to solar and stellar chemistry had never been suggested directly or indirectly by any other savant when Stokes taught it to him in Cambridge some time prior to the summer of 1852, and he set forth the conclusions, theoretical and practical, which he learnt from Stokes at that time, and which he afterwards gave regularly in his public lectures at Glasgow. These statements, containing as they do the physical basis on which spectrum analysis rests, and the mode in which it is applicable to the identification of substances existing in the sun and stars, make it appear that Stokes anticipated Kirchhoff by at least seven or eight years. Stokes, however, in a letter published some years after the delivery of this address, stated that he had failed to take one essential step in the argument (not perceiving that emission of light of definite refrangibility not merely permitted, but necessitated, absorption of light of the same refrangibility), and modestly disclaimed " any part of Kirchhoff's admirable discovery," adding that he felt some of his friends had been over-zealous in his cause. It must be said, however, that English men of science have not accepted this disclaimer in all its fullness, and still attribute to Stokes the credit of having first enunciated the fundamental principles of spectrum analysis. In another way, too, Stokes did much for the progress of mathematical physics. Soon after he was elected to the Lucasian chair he announced that he regarded it as part of his professional duties to help any member of the university in difficulties he might encounter in his mathematical studies, and the assistance rendered was so real that pupils were glad to consult him, even after they had become colleagues, on mathematical and physical problems in which they found themselves at a loss. Then during the thirty years he acted as secretary of the Royal Society he exercised an enormous if inconspicuous influence on the advancement of mathematical and physical science, not only directly by his own investigations, but indirectly by suggesting problems for inquiry and inciting men to attack them, and by his readiness to give encouragement and help.
Several of the honours enjoyed by Sir George Stokes have already been enumerated. In addition, it may be mentioned that from the Royal Society, of which he became a fellow in 1851, he received the Rumford medal in 1852 in recognition of his inquiries into the refrangibility of light, and later, in 1893, the Copley medal. In 1869 he presided over the Exeter meeting of the British Association. From 1883 to 1885 he was Burnett lecturer at Aberdeen, his lectures on Light, which were published in 1884–1887, dealing with its nature, its use as a means of investigation, and its beneficial effects. In 1891, as Gifford lecturer, he published a volume on Natural Theology. His
