286 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



genius in an equally refined, and, to us, more important one, 

 we must allow that where moderate success were highly praise- 

 worthy, the exquisite and unprecedented results which our asso- 

 ciate has reached are worthy of double honor. 



"Nor could the Academy in its award take cognizance of the 

 well-known fact that Mr. Claris skill and success, not to say 

 genius, in using his telescope are rivalled only by that displayed 

 in perfecting it. Yet this might fairly have been introduced as 

 testimony. For the prompt and brilliant discovery of the before 

 invisible companion of Sirius, and the detection of more than a 

 score of new double stars in the quarter of the heavens which had 

 been most diligently searched for them, having been made by 

 our associate with his own glasses, and mostly in testing their 

 power, these should be received as direct witnesses to the im- 

 portance of his inventions ; showing, as an experienced astron- 

 omer has remarked, ' that objects of great difficulty and delicacy 

 may be detected with very perfect telescopes of smaller size, which 

 have escaped the most diligent scrutiny with far larger instru- 

 ments ; ' showing, also, perhaps, as the same astronomer sug- 

 gests, in reference to stars which, after withstanding the Pul- 

 kowa 15-inch refractor, Mr. Clark proved to be double with his 

 object-glass of only half that diameter, * that his eye as well 

 as his telescope must possess an extraordinary power of defini- 

 tion.' " 



The following are extracts from Mr. Clark's response : 



" I know not how I can better express my gratitude for these 

 honors, than by giving some brief account of the manner in which 

 my efforts as a working optician were commenced and have been 

 carried on. 



" Up to 1844, and when more than 40 years of age, I had never 

 witnessed or attempted the grinding of a lens of any descrip- 

 tion. My elder son, George B. Clark, then a youth of 17, during 

 a school vacation, sought amusement in casting and grinding 

 small reflectors for telescopes ; and, without any thought or de- 

 sign beyond assisting him to find interest and instruction in his 

 pastime, I joined in. 



" After working and talking with astronomical friends, and 

 consulting books, until we found that reflectors, even when 

 wrought with utmost skill, were little sought for, I proposed to 

 the youth to try a refractor ; but he objected by saying, ' The 

 books represent it as a very difficult thing.' 



"Materials were, however, procured, and the attempt made, 

 with such results as to induce a repetition, and finally another, 

 until it became a settled occupation for us both. Thus it began 

 as boys' play, and, so far as my own spirits and feelings have 

 been affected by it, it has been boys' play all through. 



"There exists among the double stars such a variety, in dis- 

 tances and magnitudes, that tests for the excellence of telescopes 

 of different dimensions are always at hand; and through them 

 the- value of a glass can be made known, pretty accurate^, to a 

 distant correspondent, who has had experience, and is well versed 

 in such matters. 



