In 1885, Dr. Common, wishing to make a larger telescope on a somewhat similar plan, sold the instrument to Edward Crossley, Esq., F. R. A. S., of Halifax, England. Mr. Crossley provided the telescope with a dome of the usual form, in place of the sliding roof used by its former owner, and made observations with it for some years; but the climate of Halifax not being suitable for the best use of such a telescope, he consented, at the request of Dr. Holden, then Director of the Lick Observatory, to present it to this institution. The funds for transporting the telescope and dome to California, and setting them up on Mount Hamilton, were subscribed by friends of the Lick Observatory, for the most part citizens of California. The work was completed, and the telescope housed in a suitable observatory building, in 1895.[2] On taking charge of the Lick Observatory in 1898, I decided to devote my own observing time to the Crossley reflector, although the whole of my previous experience had been with refracting telescopes. I was more particularly desirous of testing the reflector with my own hands, because such preliminary trials of it as had been made had given rise to somewhat conflicting opinions as to its merits.[3] The result of my experience is given in the following article, which is written chiefly with reference to American readers. If I have taken occasion to point out what I regard as defects in the design or construction of the instrument, I have done so, not from any desire to look a gift horse in the mouth, but in the interest of future improvement, and to make intelligible the circumstances under which the work of the reflector is now being done and will be done hereafter. The most important improvements which have suggested themselves have indeed already been made by Dr. Common himself, in constructing his five-foot telescope. The three-foot reflector is, in spite of numerous idiosyncracies which make its management very different from the comparatively simple manipulation of a refractor, by far the most effective instrument in the Observatory for certain classes of astronomical work. Certainly no one has more reason than I to appreciate the great value of Mr. Crossley's generous gift. [Illustration: DOME OF THE CROSSLEY REFLECTOR.]