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He first listens in to determine whether messages are coming through the ether within range in the wave-length he is to use. Hearing nothing, he adjusts his sending apparatus to the desired wave-length and switches this in with the signal aerial which serves both his sending and his receiving set. This at the same time disconnects his receiving set.
His original idea was to obtain, without prism or grating, a homogeneous pencil of great wave-length sufficiently intense to be examined.
In this way they hear nothing but the Poldhu news reports which they desire to receive, and are not troubled by messages from other stations within range. Secrecy is also attained by the use of tuning. It is possible that another station may discover the wave-length being used for a secret message and "listen in," but there are so many possible wave-lengths that this is difficult.
"Yes, I believe that I am, although I hadn't noticed it until you spoke." "I have been noticing it for some time. From its effects on the skin, I am inclined to believe it to be a ray of very short wave-length, possibly something like our X-ray, or even shorter." "Have you found out what they intend to do with us?" "I don't think they have decided yet.
Then the voice broke off, because a new sound was coming from the speaker. It was a voice that was unhuman and queerly horrible and somehow machine-like. Hoots and howls and whistles came from the speaker. Wailing sounds. Ghostly noises, devoid of consonants but broadcast on a wave-length close to the G.C. band and therefore produced by intelligence, though unintelligible.
It was 10:22 P.M. Still, in the visi-screen, no other ship. Nothing but the giant planet, the smaller satellites poised against it, and the deep star-spangled curtain of black space all around. They had carefully followed the instructions in the log. They were at the exact place noted there: checked and double-checked. The radio receiver was tuned to the wave-length given in the log.
I mentioned that if we got into the building and up to Main City Level, we'd need some way of signaling to avoid being shot by our own gang, and got the wave-length combination of the Pequod scout boat, which Joe and Oscar were using for a command car. Oscar picked ten or twelve men, and they got into a lorry and went uptown and down a vehicle shaft to Second Level.
We can trace these particular frequencies, called, after their discoverer, Hertzian waves, for about fifteen octaves, when we arrive at the frequency of 32,000,000,000 in a second, with a wave-length decreased to a quarter of an inch; we can render the effect of these waves visible, but have no physical organ by which we can feel these pulsations.
Each night at a certain hour this station sends out news reports of the events of the day, using a certain set wave-length. Each ship on the Atlantic and every land station within range which is to receive the reports at that hour adjusts its receiving set to receive waves of that length.
As a ray of light continues a ray of light so long as it exists in free ether, so all kinds of radiations, of whatever wave-length, continue identical until they fall upon some mechanical structure called matter. Translatory motion continues translatory, rotary continues rotary, and vibratory continues to be vibratory, and no transforming change can take place in the absence of matter.
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