Astronomy of To-day Part 7

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE II. GREAT TELESCOPE OF HEVELIUS

This instrument, 150 feet in length, with a _skeleton_ tube, was constructed by the celebrated seventeenth century astronomer, Hevelius of Danzig. From an ill.u.s.tration in the _Machina Celestis_.

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A few of the most famous of the immensely long telescopes above alluded to are worthy of mention. One of these, 123 feet in length, was presented to the Royal Society of London by the Dutch astronomer Huyghens. Hevelius of Danzig constructed a skeleton one of 150 feet in length (see Plate II., p. 110). Bradley used a tubeless one 212 feet long to measure the diameter of Venus in 1722; while one of 600 feet is said to have been constructed, but to have proved quite unworkable!

Such difficulties, however, produced their natural result. They set men at work to devise another kind of telescope. In the new form, called the Reflecting Telescope, or "Reflector," the light coming from the object under observation was _reflected_ into the eye-piece from the surface of a highly polished concave metallic mirror, or _speculum_, as it was called. It is to Sir Isaac Newton that the world is indebted for the reflecting telescope in its best form. That philosopher had set himself to investigate the causes of the rainbow-like, or prismatic colours which for a long time had been such a source of annoyance to telescopic observers; and he pointed out that, as the colours were produced in the pa.s.sage of the rays of light _through_ the gla.s.s, they would be entirely absent if the light were reflected from the _surface_ of a mirror instead.

The reflecting telescope, however, had in turn certain drawbacks of its own. A mirror, for instance, can plainly never be polished to such a high degree as to reflect as much light as a piece of transparent gla.s.s will let through. Further, the position of the eye-piece is by no means so convenient. It cannot, of course, be pointed directly towards the mirror, for the observer would then have to place his head right in the way of the light coming from the celestial object, and would thus, of course, cut it off. In order to obviate this difficulty, the following device was employed by Newton in his telescope, of which he constructed his first example in 1668. A small, flat mirror was fixed by thin wires in the centre of the tube of the telescope, and near to its open end. It was set slant-wise, so that it reflected the rays of light directly into the eye-piece, which was screwed into a hole at the side of the tube (see Fig. 8, p. 113, "Newtonian").

Although the Newtonian form of telescope had the immense advantage of doing away with the prismatic colours, yet it wasted a great deal of light; for the objection in this respect with regard to loss of light by reflection from the large mirror applied, of course, to the small mirror also. In addition, the position of the "flat," as the small mirror is called, had the further effect of excluding from the great mirror a certain proportion of light. But the reflector had the advantage, on the other hand, of costing less to make than the refractor, as it was not necessary to procure flawless gla.s.s for the purpose. A disc of a certain metallic composition, an alloy of copper and tin, known in consequence as _speculum metal_, had merely to be cast; and this had to be ground and polished _upon one side only_, whereas a lens has to be thus treated _upon both its sides_. It was, therefore, possible to make a much larger instrument at a great deal less labour and expense.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE III. A TUBELESS, OR "AERIAL" TELESCOPE

From an ill.u.s.tration in the _Opera Varia_ of Christian Huyghens.

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[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 8.--The various types of Telescope. All the above telescopes are _pointed_ in the same direction; that is to say, the rays of light from the object are coming from the left-hand side.]

We have given the Newtonian form as an example of the principle of the reflecting telescope. A somewhat similar instrument had, however, been projected, though not actually constructed, by James Gregory a few years earlier than Newton's, _i.e._ in 1663. In this form of reflector, known as the "Gregorian" telescope, a hole was made in the big concave mirror; and a small mirror, also concave, which faced it at a certain distance, received the reflected rays, and reflected them back again through the hole in question into the eye-piece, which was fixed just behind (see Fig. 8, p. 113, "Gregorian"). The Gregorian had thus the sentimental advantage of being _pointed directly at the object_. The hole in the big mirror did not cause any loss of light, for the central portion in which it was made was anyway unable to receive light through the small mirror being directly in front of it. An adaptation of the Gregorian was the "Ca.s.segrainian" telescope, devised by Ca.s.segrain in 1672, which differed from it chiefly in the small mirror being convex instead of concave (see Fig. 8, p. 113, "Ca.s.segrainian"). These _direct-view_ forms of the reflecting telescope were much in vogue about the middle of the eighteenth century, when many beautiful examples of Gregorians were made by the famous optician, James Short, of Edinburgh.

An adaptation of the Newtonian type of telescope is known as the "Herschelian," from being the kind favoured by Sir William Herschel. It is, however, only suitable in immense instruments, such as Herschel was in the habit of employing. In this form the object-gla.s.s is set at a slight slant, so that the light coming from the object is reflected straight into the eye-piece, which is fixed facing it in the side of the tube (see Fig. 8, p. 113, "Herschelian"). This telescope has an advantage over the other forms of reflector through the saving of light consequent on doing away with the _second_ reflection. There is, however, the objection that the slant of the object-gla.s.s is productive of some distortion in the appearance of the object observed; but this slant is of necessity slight when the length of the telescope is very great.

The principle of this type of telescope had been described to the French Academy of Sciences as early as 1728 by Le Maire, but no one availed himself of the idea until 1776, when Herschel tried it. At first, however, he rejected it; but in 1786 he seems to have found that it suited the huge instruments which he was then making. Herschel's largest telescope, constructed in 1789, was about four feet in diameter and forty feet in length. It is generally spoken of as the "Forty-foot Telescope," though all other instruments have been known by their _diameters_, rather than by their lengths.

To return to the refracting telescope. A solution of the colour difficulty was arrived at in 1729 (two years after Newton's death) by an Ess.e.x gentleman named Chester Moor Hall. He discovered that by making a double object-gla.s.s, composed of an outer convex lens and an inner concave lens, made respectively of different kinds of gla.s.s, _i.e._ _crown_ gla.s.s and _flint_ gla.s.s, the troublesome colour effects could be, _to a very great extent_, removed. Hall's investigations appear to have been rather of an academic nature; and, although he is believed to have constructed a small telescope upon these lines, yet he seems to have kept the matter so much to himself that it was not until the year 1758 that the first example of the new instrument was given to the world. This was done by John Dollond, founder of the well-known optical firm of Dollond, of Ludgate Hill, London, who had, quite independently, re-discovered the principle.

This "Achromatic" telescope, or telescope "free from colour effects," is the kind ordinarily in use at present, whether for astronomical or for terrestrial purposes (see Fig. 8, p. 113, "Achromatic"). The expense of making large instruments of this type is very great, for, in the object-gla.s.s alone, no less than _four_ surfaces have to be ground and polished to the required curves; and, usually, the two lenses of which it is composed have to fit quite close together.

With the object of evading the expense referred to, and of securing _complete_ freedom from colour effects, telescopes have even been made, the object-gla.s.ses of which were composed of various transparent liquids placed between thin lenses; but leakages, and currents set up within them by changes of temperature, have defeated the ingenuity of those who devised these subst.i.tutes.

The solution of the colour difficulty by means of Dollond's achromatic refractor has not, however, ousted the reflecting telescope in its best, or Newtonian form, for which great concave mirrors made of gla.s.s, covered with a thin coating of silver and highly polished, have been used since about 1870 instead of metal mirrors. They are very much lighter in weight and cheaper to make than the old specula; and though the silvering, needless to say, deteriorates with time, it can be renewed at a comparatively trifling cost. Also these mirrors reflect much more light, and give a clearer view, than did the old metallic ones.

When an object is viewed through the type of astronomical telescope ordinarily in use, it is seen _upside down_. This is, however, a matter of very small moment in dealing with celestial objects; for, as they are usually round, it is really not of much consequence which part we regard as top and which as bottom. Such an inversion would, of course, be most inconvenient when viewing terrestrial objects. In order to observe the latter we therefore employ what is called a terrestrial telescope, which is merely a refractor with some extra lenses added in the eye portion for the purpose of turning the inverted image the right way up again.

These extra lenses, needless to say, absorb a certain amount of light; wherefore it is better in astronomical observation to save light by doing away with them, and putting up with the slight inconvenience of seeing the object inverted.

This inversion of images by the astronomical telescope must be specially borne in mind with regard to the photographs of the moon in Chapter XVI.

In the year 1825 the largest achromatic refractor in existence was one of nine and a half inches in diameter constructed by Fraunhofer for the Observatory of Dorpat in Russia. The largest refractors in the world to-day are in the United States, _i.e._ the forty-inch of the Yerkes Observatory (see Plate IV., p. 118), and the thirty-six inch of the Lick. The object-gla.s.ses of these and of the thirty-inch telescope of the Observatory of Pulkowa, in Russia, were made by the great optical house of Alvan Clark & Sons, of Cambridge, Ma.s.sachusetts, U.S.A. The tubes and other portions of the Yerkes and Lick telescopes were, however, constructed by the Warner and Swasey Co., of Cleveland, Ohio.

The largest reflector, and so the largest telescope in the world, is still the six-foot erected by the late Lord Rosse at Parsonstown in Ireland, and completed in the year 1845. It is about fifty-six feet in length. Next come two of five feet, with mirrors of silver on gla.s.s; one of them made by the late Dr. Common, of Ealing, and the other by the American astronomer, Professor G.W. Ritchey. The latter of these is installed in the Solar Observatory belonging to Carnegie Inst.i.tution of Washington, which is situated on Mount Wilson in California. The former is now at the Harvard College Observatory, and is considered by Professor Moulton to be probably the most efficient reflector in use at present. Another large reflector is the three-foot made by Dr. Common.

It came into the possession of Mr. Crossley of Halifax, who presented it to the Lick Observatory, where it is now known as the "Crossley Reflector."

Although to the house of Clark belongs, as we have seen, the credit of constructing the object-gla.s.ses of the largest refracting telescopes of our time, it has nevertheless keen compet.i.tors in Sir Howard Grubb, of Dublin, and such well-known firms as Cooke of York and Steinheil of Munich. In the four-foot reflector, made in 1870 for the Observatory of Melbourne by the firm of Grubb, the Ca.s.segrainian principle was employed.

With regard to the various merits of refractors and reflectors much might be said. Each kind of instrument has, indeed, its special advantages; though perhaps, on the whole, the most perfect type of telescope is the achromatic refractor.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE IV. THE GREAT YERKES TELESCOPE

Great telescope at the Yerkes Observatory of the University of Chicago, Williams Bay, Wisconsin, U.S.A. It was erected in 1896-7, and is the largest refracting telescope in the world. Diameter of object-gla.s.s, 40 inches; length of telescope, about 60 feet. The object-gla.s.s was made by the firm of Alvan Clark and Sons, of Cambridge, Ma.s.sachusetts; the other portions of the instrument by the Warner and Swasey Co., of Cleveland, Ohio.

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In connection with telescopes certain devices have from time to time been introduced, but these merely aim at the _convenience_ of the observer and do not supplant the broad principles upon which are based the various types of instrument above described. Such, for instance, are the "Siderostat," and another form of it called the "Coelostat," in which a plane mirror is made to revolve in a certain manner, so as to reflect those portions of the sky which are to be observed, into the tube of a telescope kept fixed. Such too are the "Equatorial Coude" of the late M. Loewy, Director of the Paris Observatory, and the "Sheepshanks Telescope" of the Observatory of Cambridge, in which a telescope is separated into two portions, the eye-piece portion being fixed upon a downward slant, and the object-gla.s.s portion jointed to it at an angle and pointed up at the sky. In these two instruments (which, by the way, differ materially) an arrangement of slanting mirrors in the tubes directs the journey of the rays of light from the object-gla.s.s to the eye-piece. The observer can thus sit at the eye-end of his telescope in the warmth and comfort of his room, and observe the stars in the same unconstrained manner as if he were merely looking down into a microscope.

Needless to say, devices such as these are subject to the drawback that the mirrors employed sap a certain proportion of the rays of light. It will be remembered that we made allusion to loss of light in this way, when pointing out the advantage in light grasp of the Herschelian form of telescope, where only _one_ reflection takes place, over the Newtonian in which there are _two_.

It is an interesting question as to whether telescopes can be made much larger. The American astronomer, Professor G.E. Hale, concludes that the limit of refractors is about five feet in diameter, but he thinks that reflectors as large as nine feet in diameter might now be made. As regards refractors there are several strong reasons against augmenting their proportions. First of all comes the great cost. Secondly, since the lenses are held in position merely round their rims, they will bend by their weight in the centres if they are made much larger. On the other hand, attempts to obviate this, by making the lenses thicker, would cause a decrease in the amount of light let through.

But perhaps the greatest stumbling-block to the construction of larger telescopes is the fact that the unsteadiness of the air will be increasingly magnified. And further, the larger the tubes become, the more difficult will it be to keep the air within them at one constant temperature throughout their lengths.

It would, indeed, seem as if telescopes are not destined greatly to increase in size, but that the means of observation will break out in some new direction, as it has already done in the case of photography and the spectroscope. The direct use of the eye is gradually giving place to indirect methods. We are, in fact, now _feeling_ rather than seeing our way about the universe. Up to the present, for instance, we have not the slightest proof that life exists elsewhere than upon our earth. But who shall say that the twentieth century has not that in store for us, by which the presence of life in other orbs may be perceived through some form of vibration transmitted across illimitable s.p.a.ce? There is no use speaking of the impossible or the inconceivable.

After the extraordinary revelations of the spectroscope--nay, after the astounding discovery of Rontgen--the word impossible should be cast aside, and inconceivability cease to be regarded as any criterion.

[8] The principle upon which the telescope is based appears to have been known _theoretically_ for a long time previous to this. The monk Roger Bacon, who lived in the thirteenth century, describes it very clearly; and several writers of the sixteenth century have also dealt with the idea. Even Lippershey's claims to a practical solution of the question were hotly contested at the time by two of his own countrymen, _i.e._ a certain Jacob Metius, and another spectacle-maker of Middleburgh, named Jansen.

CHAPTER XI

SPECTRUM a.n.a.lYSIS

If white light (that of the sun, for instance) be pa.s.sed through a gla.s.s prism, namely, a piece of gla.s.s of triangular shape, it will issue from it in rainbow-tinted colours. It is a common experience with any of us to notice this when the sunlight shines through cut-gla.s.s, as in the pendant of a chandelier, or in the stopper of a wine-decanter.

The same effect may be produced when light pa.s.ses through water. The Rainbow, which we all know so well, is merely the result of the sunlight pa.s.sing through drops of falling rain.

White light is composed of rays of various colours. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet, taken all together, go, in fact, to make up that effect which we call white.

It is in the course of the _refraction_, or bending of a beam of light, when it pa.s.ses in certain conditions through a transparent and denser medium, such as gla.s.s or water, that the const.i.tuent rays are sorted out and spread in a row according to their various colours. This production of colour takes place usually near the edges of a lens; and, as will be recollected, proved very obnoxious to the users of the old form of refracting telescope.

It is, indeed, a strange irony of fate that this very same production of colour, which so hindered astronomy in the past, should have aided it in recent years to a remarkable degree. If sunlight, for instance, be admitted through a narrow slit before it falls upon a gla.s.s prism, it will issue from the latter in the form of a band of variegated colour, each colour blending insensibly with the next. The colours arrange themselves always in the order which we have mentioned. This seeming band is, in reality, an array of countless coloured images of the original slit ranged side by side; the colour of each image being the slightest possible shade different from that next to it. This strip of colour when produced by sunlight is called the "Solar Spectrum" (see Fig. 9, p. 123). A similar strip, or _spectrum_, will be produced by any other light; but the appearance of the strip, with regard to preponderance of particular colours, will depend upon the character of that light. Electric light and gas light yield spectra not unlike that of sunlight; but that of gas is less rich in blue and violet than that of the sun.

The Spectroscope, an instrument devised for the examination of spectra, is, in its simplest form, composed of a small tube with a narrow slit and prism at one end, and an eye-piece at the other. If we drop ordinary table salt into the flame of a gas light, the flame becomes strongly yellow. If, then, we observe this yellow flame with the spectroscope, we find that its spectrum consists almost entirely of two bright yellow transverse lines. Chemically considered ordinary table salt is sodium chloride; that is to say, a compound of the metal sodium and the gas chlorine. Now if other compounds of sodium be experimented with in the same manner, it will soon be found that these two yellow lines are characteristic of sodium when turned into vapour by great heat. In the same manner it can be ascertained that every element, when heated to a condition of vapour, gives as its spectrum a set of lines peculiar to itself. Thus the spectroscope enables us to find out the composition of substances when they are reduced to vapour in the laboratory.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 9.--The Solar Spectrum.]

In order to increase the power of a spectroscope, it is necessary to add to the number of prisms. Each extra prism has the effect of lengthening the coloured strip still more, so that lines, which at first appeared to be single merely through being crowded together, are eventually drawn apart and become separately distinguishable.

On this principle it has gradually been determined that the sun is composed of elements similar to those which go to make up our earth.

Further, the composition of the stars can be ascertained in the same manner; and we find them formed on a like pattern, though with certain elements in greater or less proportion as the case may be. It is in consequence of our thus definitely ascertaining that the stars are self-luminous, and of a sun-like character, that we are enabled to speak of them as _suns_, or to call the sun a _star_.

In endeavouring to discover the elements of which the planets and satellites of our system are composed, we, however, find ourselves baffled, for the simple reason that these bodies emit no real light of their own. The light which reaches us from them, being merely reflected sunlight, gives only the ordinary solar spectrum when examined with the spectroscope. But in certain cases we find that the solar spectrum thus viewed shows traces of being weakened, or rather of suffering absorption; and it is concluded that this may be due to the sunlight having had to pa.s.s through an atmosphere on its way to and from the surface of the planet from which it is reflected to us.