The Somerset press. [volume] (Somerset, Ohio) 1873-1977, 1875-01-01
The Transit of Venus compliments
to Americans from England.

The London Times of December Il
in an article upon the Transit of Venus
says:
To begin with the United States. The
efforts made BY the Government and the
astronomers of this country are of very
remarkable kind. The Government has
granted sum in aid greater than that
voted by any other country. The OBJ
servers are most of them not only long
trained observers, but men such as Pro-
fossors c. III. Peters, Hall and Watson,
whose names are thoroughly well known
all over Europe. Their preliminary in
quiries and investigations have been OF
the most searching kind, and the docu-
ments and charts which lie before us as
we write, which have been published by
the specially appointed and strong Com
mission, of which Professor Newcomb is
Secretary, are of the highest value, and
yesterday we took occasion TO refer to
the use they have been to US in the pre-
paration of these notes.
All the American stations are Haley
ana statement which is no longer ne
cessary for US to explain. They are eight
in all
The Americans propose to make a
large use of photography, and for this
purpose they employ an arrangement
first used many years ago by Professor
Winlock for photographs of the sun. The
English photoheilograph is telescope
pointed to the sun, and made to fellow
its motion by clock work, and the image
| thrown by the object glass-a small
image, as the focus is necessarily short
under these circumstances-after magni-
| flying by a secondary lens, is received
on a Photographic plate. Now the
Americans object to this enlargement by
the interpolated lens, and they get the
image as large as they require-some
four inches-directly, by employing an
object glass of long focus-40 feet or
| Whereabouts. But a telescope of this
length would be very difficult to noun,
steadily and drive by clockwork; so that
instead of causing the telescope to follow
the sun, they contrive a very perfect
plane mirror, placed in front of the OBJ
ject glass to follow the sun. In this way
a perfectly steady image is obtained al
the focus ofthe 40 foot telescope, placed
| in horizontal position, and the Amer
leans claim, and we think with reason,
that this method possesses several ad-
vantages.
| Photographs made by these instru-
ments will be taken, weather permitting
at all the stations during the whole
/ time of transit, and we already know
that more or less complete series have
| been taken at Wladivostock, Nagasaki
and Hobart Town. OF course these
| photographs, like all others taken by
different methods by the parties of the
/ other nations, will be multiplied, as far
as possible, at the time of the two inter-
| ior contacts, but as the Americans do
not employ Janssen's revolver, they
| supplement the contact photographs and
eye observations by careful micrometer
measurements of the separation of the
cusps of Venus when entering on and
| leaving the sun. If the reader will slide
a threepenny piece over the edge of a
| penny, he will see the importance of
these observations. The two points at
which the edge of the threepenny piece
and the penny appear in contact are the
cusps, and it is easy to see how the dis
tance between them will first increase
and then decrease as the planet passes
| from external TO internal contact. These
are among the observations telegraphed
| from the American party at Nagasaki.
| These observations will be made by
| equatorially mounted telescopes, made
by Alvan Clark, whose name is suffi-
cient guarantee for their excellence. In
addition to these there will be at each
station the usual accompaniments of tel.
escopes-l. E., transit instrument and a
clock, and we have already been inform
ed how usefully these instruments have
been employed in determining positions
not only astronomically, but by means
of the electric telegraph method
which the Americans so wisely use
wherever they go and from which we
so largely benefit; for we believe, to take
an example, that the longitudes of our
naval stations in the Mediterranean,
Gibraltar and Malta have been deter
mined for US by the Americans. and not
| by ourselves, and yet one would have
have had some interest for us.