Page:The atomic theory (1914).djvu/34

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30
The Atomic Theory

a much simpler one, and is of the kind shown by the curve in Fig. 2, which represents, according to the experiments of Mr. Whiddington, the relation between the energy required by cathode rays to excite the characteristic Röntgen radiation of an atom and its atomic weight; the same curve will, from the results of the experiments of Mr. Moseley and Mr. Darwin, represent

Fig. 2.

the relation between the frequency of the characteristic radiation and the atomic weight. The constitutive properties vary in a quasi-periodic and fluctuating way with the atomic weight, while the intrinsic ones steadily increase or decrease, as the atomic weight increases. This is what we should have expected after our consideration of the properties of groups of electrons when in stable equilibrium. We have seen that there cannot