Atlanta Georgian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1912-1939, 1913-02-28
Garrett P. Serviss
Writes on
Woman's
Imagination
How 1t Was Responsible for .
Marvellous Astronon,;ood1
Discovery. '"'
By GARRETT P. SERvrss

A0NONOIJ.
By GARRETT P. sERvrss
Err name was Mrs. Pound
II and she was a widow I CIV,
was worth her weieb+ T.
gold TO English science. almost tn,D
hundred years ago. and all on ao
count of a Sweetness of temnsn
that was truly monumental
Without a single murmur wiz.
out one cross look even, she non
mitted her nephew. u young man
named James Bradley, to take nos
session of her coal cellar and so4
up his telescope there. Then Mr.
he proceeded to cut a hole tbrcnoI,
the basement floor, and Mrs. POND
saw the telescope thrustinp n,
head UP among the kitchen ntan
sis, she smiled blandly and moved
things out of it's way.
Confidence Well Placed.
Next, Bradley cut a hole thror,h
the parlor floor, and then ono
through the bedroom floor and
finally one through the roof itself
The telescope stretched Itself Longer
as the holes We're made for il nm.
til at last its object end was on tho
roof, and it's eye end in the cellar.
and never during the whole course
of this devastation did the Widow
Pounds sweet temper show anv
variation.
Although she was compelled to
attend to her household affairs. her
mind was capable of rising above
them, and of judging the relative
values of things. She saw that the
inconvenience to which she was
put was absolutely nothing in COM
parison with the satisfaction she
would derive from seeing her en-
thusiastic nephew make a great
discovery by getting a long tele-
scope securely pointed at those
stars above the roof, of which he
was perpetually talking.
Mrs. Pounds confidence was well
placed, and one day she felt amply
rewarded when all Europe rang
with the news that James Bradley
had made one of the most signal
discoveries that any man ever did
that of the alteration of light
in explaining what alteration Of
light is we shall see why Bradley
treated his aunt's house so uncere-
mOniously.
If you stand in a rainstorm on a
MINDLESS day. you see the rain de-
scending in vertical lines. and your
hat brim protects your face. Now.
if you start to walk or run in any
direction, the raindrops strike you
in the face, because you meet them
sideways as they are falling, and
your motion is compounded with
theirs so that they appear to come
in slanting lines. The ratio Of your
motion to that of the falling ram
will determine the angle at which
the latter seems to slope.
The same thing, as Bradley found
out, happens with the light of the
stars 1t falls upon the earth with
a speed of 1860 miles per sec
ond but at the same time the earth
is moving forward in its orbit
around the sun at the speed oil
1912 miles per second. The con-
sequence is that we do not see the
stars exactly where they really are
in the sky, but at Il perceptlble an
gular distance ahead Of their actual
places. This arises from the same
phenomenon as that which causes
rain that is really falling vertically
to seem to come into the face OF
runner, on a slant, from the direc-
ton in which he is going.
The speed of light is about 10000
times as rapid as the earth's mo-
ton in it's orbit. so that the angie
of slope at which the starlight en-
ters the eye is very small Brad
ley, however, succeeded in measur-
ing it.
But, in order to make his DIS
covery-and, in reality, the discoN-
cry he made was not the one ne
was looking for-he had to have
very long telescope pointed almost
exactly overhead, and firmly sup
ported by some solid object, than
which nothing seemed better tor
his purpose than his aunts CHM