VIII. 



A VISIT TO GREENWICH OBSERVATORY. 



" And for the heaven's wide circuit, let it speak 

 The Maker's high magnificence ; Who built 

 So spacious, and His line stretched out so far, 

 That man may know he dwells not in his own." 



MILTON. 



.VEN in the non-astronomical mind, the 

 contemplation of a visit to the famous 

 observatory of Greenwich could not 

 but produce the liveliest anticipations 

 of pleasure and instruction. When, therefore, an 

 arrangement had been made for a few of us to 

 go down to that mysterious workshop of envied 

 students of the skies, the hour was looked forward 

 to with great and eager hopes. Being at that 

 time the happy possessor of a three-inch telescope 

 equatorially mounted, and having dabbled in the 

 allied pursuits of photography and spectroscopy, I 

 naturally cherished large expectations of adding 

 to my scanty stock of knowledge in regard to these 

 most attractive branches of astronomical science. 



We none of us, of course, believed that we were 

 going to see the most advanced instruments which 



