The Practical Astronomer: Comprising illustrations of light and colours--practical descriptions of all kinds of telescopes--the use of the equatorial-transit--circular, and other astronomical instruments, a particular account of the Earl of Rosse's large telescopes, and other topics connected with astronomyDick, Thomas
Science
The Practical Astronomer: Comprising illustrations of light and colours--practical descriptions of all kinds of telescopes--the use of the equatorial-transit--circular, and other astronomical instruments, a particular account of the Earl of Rosse's large telescopes, and other topics connected with astronomy
Dick, Thomas
Astronomical instruments; Astronomy; Telescopes
Saturn with the 20 and 40 feet telescopes. _Twenty feet._ The fifth
satellite of Saturn is very small. The first, second, third, fourth and
fifth, and the new sixth satellites are in their calculated places.
_Forty feet._ I see the new sixth satellite much better with this
instrument than with the 20 feet. The fifth is also much larger here
than in the 20 feet, in which it was nearly the same size as a small
fixed star, but here it is considerably larger than that star.’
These examples, and many others of a similar kind, explain sufficiently
the nature and extent of that species of power that one telescope
possesses over another, in consequence of its enlarged aperture; but
the exact quantity of this power is in some degree uncertain. To
ascertain practically the illuminating power of telescopes, we must
try them with equal powers on such objects as the following,--the
small stars near the pole-star, and near Rigel and ε Bootis--the
division in the ring of Saturn--and distant objects in the twilight or
towards the evening. These objects are distinctly seen with a 5 feet
achromatic of 3-8/10 inches aperture, and an illuminating power of
144, while they are scarcely visible in a 3-1/2 feet with an aperture
of 2-3/4 inches, and an illuminating power of 72, supposing the same
magnifying power to be applied. The illuminating power of a telescope
is best estimated, in regard to land objects, when it is tried on
minute objects, and such as are badly lighted up; and the advantage
of a telescope with a large aperture will be most obvious, when it is
compared with another of inferior size in the close of the evening,
when looking at a printed bill composed of letters of various sizes. As
darkness comes on, the use of illuminating power becomes more evident.
In a 5 feet telescope some small letters will be legible, which are
hardly discernible in the 3-1/2 feet, and in the 2-1/2 feet are quite
undefinable, though the magnifying powers be equal. Sir W. Herschel
informs us, that in the year 1776, when he had erected a telescope of
20 feet focal length of the Newtonian construction, one of its effects
by trial was, that when towards evening, on account of darkness, the
natural eye could not penetrate far into space, the telescope possessed
that power sufficiently to show, by the dial of a distant church
steeple, what o’clock it was, notwithstanding the naked eye could no
longer see the steeple itself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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