THE PLANT WORLD UNDER CARE. 



121 



beast and bee, witb every breeze, cloud 

 and sky, one should have an intelligent, 

 sympathetic relationship. 



The two greatest sources of pleasure 

 in life, perhaps, are the creation of some- 

 thing good and the appreciation of what 

 has been created. Both of these pleas- 



ures are open to us all, even within the 

 gates of our own garden. We may here 

 gladly co-operate with nature in the cre- 

 ation of new and beautiful life, and we 

 may here gladden our lives by the appre- 

 ciation of nature's creation. 



AN INEXPE>SIVE HOME-MADE 

 TELESCOPE. 



BY LATIMER J. WILSON, 828 DAWSON ST., 

 NLW YORK. 



Can you imagine a telescope made of 

 clothes hooks, stretcher sticks, paper 

 mailing tubes, paper boxes, canvas 

 strips and parts of an old bedstead? 

 The photograph, which illustrates this 

 article, will help your imagination, for 

 it shows a telescope made of just such 

 commonplace material. With a few in- 

 expensive lenses and a little ingenuity, 

 the old paper boxes that are hiding in 

 a corner of the attic, and the other odds 

 and ends about the house can be pressed 

 into service, with a result that is sure 

 to be a delightful surprise. 



For one or two dollars can be pur- 

 chased, an ordinary double convex lens, 

 three or four inches in diameter, and 

 having a focus of about forty-eight 

 inches; this will do for the object glass. 

 A meniscus lens would be better, but 

 would cost a little more. An achromat- 

 ic lens would certainly be most satis- 

 factory, but a more suitable mounting 

 would be preferred to that described 

 here ; and this is to be a telescope which 

 anyone can make. 



We will begin with the large tube, 

 which can be made from the paper 

 boxes if they are the required length. 

 The paper should be about one-eighth 

 of an inch thick and should be rolled to 

 make a cylinder of double thickness 

 which will be five inches shorter than 

 the focal length of the lens, and with an 



outside diameter exactly the same as the 

 diameter of the lens. To make 



the tube perfectly round, it can be 

 shaped on a solid form while the two 

 thicknesses of paper are glued together, 

 and securely tied until the glue is dry. 

 The solid form is easily made by rolling 

 newspapers tightly around a curtain 

 pole until the desired size is obtained. 

 Both ends of the tube should be cut per- 

 fectly true. 



We will now cut a strip from the 

 paper box, six inches wide and long 

 enough to make a cylinder of double 

 thickness, which will fit around the out- 

 side of the tube. This cylinder should 

 be glued firmly to the tube, being al- 

 lowed to project two inches over the 

 end upon which the lens will rest, thus 

 making a cap to hold the lens. A flat 

 metal strip can lie pressed against the 

 lens to hold it firmly in place. Fig. 1. 



In the opposite end of the tube, we 

 shall fix a paper mailing tube, about two 

 inches outside diameter and twelve 

 inches long. Glue heavy paper around 

 this, until it fits tightly into the large 

 tube and is exactly centered. Fig. 2. 

 It should be entirely within the end of 

 the larsie tube and immovable. An- 

 other tube, fourteen inches long, can be 

 arranged to fit into the two inch tube and 

 will be used for focusing. It can be 

 made to slide easily in and out, by past- 

 ing sheets of smooth letter paper around 

 it. 



For the eyepiece, two piano convex 

 lenses should be obtained, one having a 



