THE GREAT RUSSIAN TELESCOPE. 49 
places under the stars. The last lingering rays of twiUght faintly suffuse the 
West, the new Moon, only a day old, holding the old Moon in her arms, is near- 
ing the horizon, and the zodiacal light spreads its cone of pale gold high up among 
the eternal stars. Under the dark dome arching above us the brightest stars and 
clusters of stellar space look down with friendly eyes, and seem to hang low, as 
if they would hold communion with mortals. Among them thread the planets 
Jupiter and Saturn, whose mysterious portals we, audacious invaders, are seeking 
to enter this night with necromantic art. Rising from a surface of unbroken 
snow, and looming up with shadowy indistinctness, the huge telescope seems to 
pierce the skies, while the observers at its base dwindle to pigmies. 
After a short time the instrument is ready for action ; its open eye is turned 
upon the planet Saturn. The serene star, upon which a moment before we had 
turned our unaided eye, is suddenly transformed into a creation of surpassing 
beauty. A superb golden sphere, as large as the full Moon, lies before us. Sat- 
urn is softly cradled in the protecting embrace of his engirdling rings, and seven 
of his eight moons are visible as bright points on the dark background of the sky. 
Titan, the largest moon, has a perceptible disk. Every detail of the magnificent 
and complex Saturnian system is complete. The outer ring, with its faint line of 
division ; the division between the outer and inner rings; the inner or second 
ring ; the third or crepe ring, closely joined to the second, the break on the rings 
formed by the shadow or the planet; and the soft markings on his disk. Noth- 
ing is wanted in the minutest details, and there is but one imperfection in the 
picture. The definition is not good ; the outhnes are not clearly defined. The 
view does not differ greatly in dimensions from that presented by a smaller tele- 
scope, but planet and rings are flooded with light of dehcious brilliancy and soft- 
ness. Here lies the advantage of a great telescope. It brings to the eye all the 
light that enters it, so that, within certain Umits, the larger the telescope the larger 
the amount of light it collects, the more easily visible will faint objects become, 
and the greater the number of objects before unseen that will be revealed. 
Terrestrial colors are muddy in comparison with the celestial hues of liquid 
gold of the disk and rings, and the creamy tints of the belts that cross the disk 
with the lightness and grace of scudding cloud bands. The sphere seems almost 
to stand upright within the encircHng rings, only a small portion of the planet 
being seen beneath them. We have fallen upon favorable conditions for a view 
of Saturn, for his rings are opening to their widest extent, his northern declina- 
tion is increasing, and he is approaching perihelion. 
Jupiter is the next object to test the space annihilating power of the instru- 
ment. The Prince of Planets is superb, larger than the full Moon, though but 
little larger than we have seen him many times in a telescope of eight inches 
aperture. He is, however, much brighter, and though by no means as magnifi- 
cent as Saturn, we have the pleasure of feeling that we see him on a much larger 
scale. He seems so near that we are impelled to put our hands behind the glass 
and touch him. His broad belts are delicious in coloring, now suffused with pale 
VII— 4 
