14 Proceedings of Boyal Bociety of Edinburgh. [dec. 5, 
how remarkably the whole of them, as methods of amelioration for 
the long considered impossibilities of this Edinburgh Equatorial, 
which Governments and governing Boards and Central Committees 
have so totally failed in through more than a dozen years, — flow 
from, or are bound up with, the one beautifully simple idea, of trans- 
ferring the eye-piece from the upper end of the telescope, to near the 
opposite or outer end of the Declination Axis, by altering the angle 
only, of the small mirror, and not introducing any additional reflection. 
It is this change which at once renders the Dome quite large 
enough for the telescope ; which relieves the instrument of the 
immense amount of dead weight it was found unable to carry ; 
which gives the observer a sheltered position to observe in, and his 
assistant plenty of room for working, either on one side or the 
other ; while it also enables the modern science of spectroscopy to 
take up its position with power and dignity, in greater space than 
ever allowed to a star spectroscope before. 
And where did this simple, yet all powerful and most suitable 
idea come from 1 
It was not with me, at any of the consultations over the instru- 
ment I assisted at many years ago. I have never heard it hinted 
at by any one else. Yet here it is now, because it very lately came to 
me. And came, I know not how, unless as a gracious gift from above, 
and at a moment of dire extremity, from the Giver of all Good. 
Wherefore, if in this very advanced Christian age of the world, I 
were to hesitate for a moment, between misleadingly allowing the 
public to give the credit to me ; or, on the other hand, attributing it 
myself frankly and thankfully to God, to whom it is alone due, I 
should deserve, like another person, well known by name, “ to be 
eaten of worms and to give up the ghost”; instead of having been 
thus graciously preserved, through more than one generation of 
University Professors, up to the present moment;* for further 
work, may it be, in elucidating the glory of the sidereal creations of 
the Divine Architect of all things. 
Appendix I. 
Memoranda of smaller and local practical matters, considered long 
ago as necessary to be attended to whenever a practical beginning 
* October 1887. 
