Glitch Manor, Weardale England, June 1856: Not long ago, through an odd circumstance, I became aware of the following letter from Ernest Glitch of Weardale to Michael Faraday. The letter describes the demonstration of a nitrogen TEA (Transversely Excited, Atmospheric pressure) laser, using air as the lasing medium. This occured in Victorian England over a century before Maiman`s ruby laser or Javan`s helium-neon laser. The letter reads as follows …
“My Dear Faraday,
“I would like to expound to you a phenomenon of singular curiosity, apparent during investigations into expanding the electrical spark. It affords me little joy as my discovery took the sight from Hodges right eye and I have had to dismiss him. As my last correspondence indicated, I have surmised that the experiments are deleterious to poor Hodges, his health having sharply deteriorated due, I think, to the quicksilver effluvia he breathed during leyden phial silvering.
“The leyden battery is now complete! What a detonation is delivered after charging for some time! I had Hodges place a ball of box-wood in the path of the spark …
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