The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1864-04-29
A Noble Mechanic.

the irish peerage-a noble vulcan, q
smith and an astronomer-equally at home
in the forge or among the stars. Most
people have heard Of his lordship, or ii
they have not heard of him they have
heard of his great telescope, ffty-three
feet long aud six feet in diameter, through
which the celebrated uebula of Sir John
Herschel was first seen, in its most dis
tinct aspect Of myriad clustering stars
and last summer it was asserted that his
lordship had an early private view through
this same monster, of the approach of the
hot weather, aud was thereby enabled to
erect sheds for cattle. The great tele.
scope stands in the middle of the demesne,
and is slung between two massive stone
walls, something like pier of the suspen-
sion bridge, without the arch connecting
the tide masonry.
The first thing that strikes you is, that
it is like gigantic piece of wooden ord,
nance, being put together with tremendous
slaves, like cask. The instrument is
pointed at a given angle toward the heat
ems, and down in the bottom of the huge
cylinder or cask, if you choose to call it
such, is the spectrum or reflector, the lar
gcst that has ever been made, and the
manufacture of which, under his own su-
periuteudence, was the triumph Of Lord
Rosse's mechanical powers
In this metallic mirror is reflected the
heavenly body under observation, and on
stage near the opening at the top stands
the observer, examining at leisure planet,
fixed star, meteor or nebula, just as the
case may be. Here, pigmy man reviews
the heavenly host but Lord Rossc is no
pigmy. If his father had worn a black
smiths apron instead of ermine or sables,
the son would have risen from the cinders
of the forge to be Stephenson or Her.
schel.
The Earrs residence, Rose Castle, is a
most amusing mixture of the forge and
feudal fortress. The greater part of the
structure is comparatively new, but por-
tons of the old castle, which, in the Jaco.
bite wars, stood a brief siege, still remain,
and bear upon them the traces of cannon
balls. The present policeman has sur
rounded the building with rampant and
fosse, SO that in sudden emergency it
might be turned to strategical account
Fertilization is one of the many branches
of knowledge to which he has turned his
thoughts, but when you get within the
line of defenses, what contrast to baro-
NAL or military force the objects that meet
your eye afford The genius of Watt tri-
umphs over the limitations of Vauban.
Where cannon might have bristled a
tidy steam engine worked; great latbes
turned under the towers that frowued de-
fance at james forces; in the stables,
where racing stud or war-steed might
have been sheltered, most ingenious and
powerful apparatus for the polishing Of
the great speculun was fixed in the cor
her of the castle yard was furnace, and
close by stood the moulds in which the
monster reAsctors were cast by his lord
ship, with face and hands begrimed With
sweat and coal dust-an event more im-
portant, but not as worthiy recorded, as
the casting of Schiller's bell. Scraps of
iron and smiths coal stras ed the ground
and, instead Of the baying of hound or the
horn of hunter, you bear the sustained
deep breathing Of a pair of forge bellows,
above which ring the measured clang of
sledge and anvil for his lordship is never
idle. .,.