224 Notice of the late Sheldon Clark. 



commodities, or collect the dues on outstanding notes. The 

 treasurer's receipts for the money for the telescope lie before me, 

 and may be worth copying, as an example of the manner in which 

 an industrious and frugal farmer, by the use of moderate means, 

 was able to accomplish an important end. 



Paymsnts hy Sheldon Clark to the Treasurer of Yale College 

 for a telescope. 



February 22d, 1828, $100 



March 7th, " 100 



April 16th, " 200 



May 26th, " 50 



October 28th, " 100 



November 5th, ------ 142 



November 11th, " 88 



" " 100 



December 1st, " 120 



August 26th, 1829, 200 



|1,200 

 Of this donation, nineteen guineas were, by order of the donor, 

 employed in the purchase of a pair of large globes by Carey, 

 (twenty-one inches in diameter,) one celestial and the other ter- 

 restrial, elegantly mounted and covered. The telescope* was 

 ordered of Dollond. Captain Basil Hall happened to be at the 

 college at the time, and kindly volunteered to give his personal 

 attention, with the maker, to the execution and arrangement of 

 the instrument. Mr. Clark limited a period of two years, within 

 which it was to be done or the money given by him was to be 

 returned. It arrived in November, 1829, and was pronounced 

 by Dollond to be "perfect, and such an instrument as he was 

 pleased to send as a specimen of his powers." In a letter of Sep- 

 tember 3, 1835, Prof Olmsted announces to Mr. Clark the dis- 



* This telescope, (which, out of respect to the donor, is distinguished by the 

 name of Clark's Telescope,) proves, says Prof Olmsted, to be an excellent instru- 

 ment. It has a focal length often feet, and an aperture of five inches. The object- 

 glass is finely achromatic, and the light is very pure and abundant. For objects 

 that require a fine light, as some of the nebulae and smaller stars, this instrument 

 exhibits great superiority, and its defining power is equally eminent. It has a 

 good variety of eye-glasses, and a spider-line micrometer of the best construction. 

 On favorable evenings, the views of the moon when in quadrature, of the planets, 

 and of the milky way, are superb. 



