LEVEL, an instrument which enables us to find a line or surface exactly level; that is, such as shall be everywhere parallel to the true horizon, or at right angles to the plumb-line or direction of gravity. It also enables us to find the difference between the heights of two or more places on the surface of the earth.

Amongst the great variety of instruments which have been invented for these purposes, and which are all guided by the agency of gravitation, the following are the most important and useful.

Levels in which the plummet or plumb-line forms the most essential part have been constructed in many different forms, and under as many names, to suit the purpose or fancies of the various artificers who employ them; such as masons, bricklayers, paviors, carpenters, and others. But the general principle of the construction is to attach a thread and plummet to the upper part of a board or flat frame of wood or metal, in such a manner that, when the thread of this plummet, hanging freely, coincides with, a fiducial line marked on the frame, it is at right angles to the base of the instrument; so that when this occurs, the thing to which the base is applied must obviously be level; but if the thread declines from the mark, the thing is lower on one side than the other. In some of these levels, the fiducial line or mark is at the middle of the base, in others at or near the end. But though it is easy to see, that the longer the base, and the farther down the thread the fiducial line extends, so much the more accurate or sensible is the instrument likely to be; yet little or no regard is generally had to this in practice. The vibrations of the lead, which are troublesome in nice operations, may be in a great measure prevented by having it immersed [7:13:257]in a vessel with water or other liquor. Sometimes the plummet is enclosed in a glass cover to protect it from the agitation of the wind, and sights or even a telescope are occasionally applied. For a telescope may be added to any kind of level, by applying it upon or parallel to the base of the instrument when there is occasion to take the level of remote objects. One of the simplest forms of a plumb-level is shown in fig. 1, Plate CCCXXII.; and the next we shall describe is another.

The Artillery Foot-Level is in the form of a carpenter’s square, having its two legs or branches of equal lengths; at their juncture is a little hole, whence hangs a thread and plummet playing on a quadrant, which is divided into twice forty-five degrees from the middle, as shown in fig. 2.

By placing the feet or ends of its two branches on a plane, in such a manner that the thread may play perpendicularly over the middle division of the quadrant, the plane is assuredly level. To use it in gunnery, place the two ends on the piece of artillery, which may be raised to any proposed height, as indicated by the plummet, whose thread will give the degree above the level.

Gunners Level, for levelling cannons and mortars, consists of a triangular brass plate about four inches high (fig. 3), at the bottom of which is a portion of a circle, divided only into forty-five degrees, as this number is sufficient for the highest elevation of cannons and mortars, and for giving shot the greatest range. On the centre of a segment of a circle turns a piece of brass A B, which may be fixed by a screw at pleasure. Its lower end B serves for a plummet and index, to show the different degrees of elevation of pieces of artillery. This instrument has also a brass foot, not shown in the figure, to set upon cannons or mortars; so that when those pieces are horizontal, the instrument is perpendicular. The foot is to be placed on the piece to be elevated, in such a manner that the point of the plummet may fall on the proper degree; this they call levelling the piece.

The Balance-Level is wholly suspended as a pendulum. It is furnished with sights, which, when the instrument hangs at rest, show the line of level, and sometimes even a telescope is applied to it. Levels of this sort have been made in various forms. They have but little sensibility, and are liable to be sadly disturbed by the wind.

Desagulier’s level, described at considerable length in almost every treatise on this subject, is essentially the same with the method of measuring heights by the barometer, to which, as a mode of levelling, we therefore beg to refer.

Reflecting Level, that made by means of a pretty long surface of water representing the same object inverted which we see erect by the eye; so that the point where these two objects appear to meet, is on a level with the place where the surface of the water is found.

There is another reflecting level, consisting of a mirror of steel, or the like, well polished, and placed a little before the object-glass of a telescope, suspended perpendicularly. This mirror must make an angle of 45° with the telescope, in which case the perpendicular line of the telescope is converted into a horizontal line, which is the same with the line of level.

Water-Level, that which shows the horizontal line by means of a surface of water or other liquor, founded on this principle, that a liquid always places itself level.

The most simple water-level is made of a long wooden trough or canal, whose sides are parallel to the base; so tnat, being equally filled with water, its surface shows the line of level. This is the chorobates of the ancients, described by Vitruvius.

It is also made with two cups fitted to the two ends of a pipe three or four feet long/ bout an inch in diameter, by means of which the water communicates from the one cup to the other; and this pipe being moveable on its stand by means of a ball and socket, when the two cups become equally full of water, their two surfaces mark the line of level.

This instrument, instead of cups, may also be made with two short cylinders of glass three or four inches long, fastened to each extreme of the pipe with wax or mastic. Into the pipe is poured some common or coloured water, which shows itself through the cylinders, by means of which the line of level is determined; the height of the water being the same in both cylinders, whether these are themselves perfectly level or not. This level, though very simple, is yet very commodious for levelling at small distances. Various instruments constructed on this principle with water, mercury, and other liquids, have aimed at great perfection; but, as refined levels, we consider them so inferior to the spirit-level, shortly to be noticed, as not to merit a particular description here.

Air-Level, that which shows the line of level by means of a bubble of air enclosed with some liquor in a glass tube which is slightly convex upward, and has its two ends hermetically sealed. When the bubble fixes itself at a certain mark in the middle of the tube, the plane or ruler whereon it is fixed is level. When it is not level, the bubble will rise to one end. This glass tube may be set in another of brass, or in a piece of wood, having an aperture in the middle, through which the bubble of air may be observed. The liquor with which the tube is filled is most commonly alcohol or spirit of wine. This application of a bubble of air is said to be the invention of Dr Hooke; but some ascribe it to; Thevenot.

One of these instruments made with sights, is an improvement upon that last described,Zand, by a little additional apparatus, becomes more commodious and exact. It consists of an air-level AB (fig. 4), about eight inches long, and seven or eight fines in diameter, set in a brass tube 2, with an aperture in the middle C. The tubes are supported by a straight ruler a foot long, at whose end are fixed two sights, 3, 3, exactly perpendicular to the tubes, and of an equal height, having a square hole, subdivided by a cross of thin brass, in the middle of which is drilled a very small hole, through which a point on a level with the instrument is observed. The brass tube is fastened on the ruler by means of two screws, one of which, marked 4, serves to raise or depress the tube at pleasure, for bringing it towards a level. The top of the ball and socket is riveted to a little ruler that springs, one end whereof is fastened with a screw to the great ruler, and at the other end has a screw, 5, serving to raise and depress the instrument when nearly level.

We should consider wires greatly preferable to sights with holes, which, though very small, will take in too great a space to determine the point of level precisely. But the principle of the air-level is brought to an incomparably greater degree of perfection in the instrument next to be described.

Spirit-Level. The most accurate levelling instrument in use, and that possessed of the greatest essential advantages, is the spirit-level, which was first constructed by Mr Sisson, and to which various additions and improvements have been since made, particularly by Mr Ramsden. The following is a description of one of the best of these levels. Fig. 5 represents the instrument mounted on its staves, PQR. The telescope, AB, is made from fifteen inches to two feet in length, as may be required. It is achromatic, of the best kind, and shows the objects erect. By turning the screw a at the side of the telescope, the object-glass is moved; and thus the telescope is exactly adapted to the eye. In the focus of the eyeglasses are exceedingly fine cross wires, the intersection of which should be so perfectly in the axis of the tube, [7:13:258]that by turning it round on its two supporters D, E, and looking through the telescope, the intersection of the wires may constantly cut the same part of the object viewed. They are easily adjusted to this state by means of the four screws bbbb placed on the telescope, near the end for the eye. These screws act in directions perpendicular to one another, so that, by unscrewing one and tightening the opposite one, the wire perpendicular to them may be moved either way at pleasure; and in this manner the other wire may be moved, and thus the intersection of the wires is brought exactly into the axis of the tube.

To the telescope is fixed, by two small screws, the level tube cd i containing the spirits, with a small bubble of air: this bubble, when the instrument is well adjusted, will settle exactly in the same place, in or near the middle of its tube, whether the telescope be reversed or not on the supporters, which in this case are kept unmoved. To render the level truly parallel to the telescope, the screw at c adjusts it vertically, and that at d horizontally. The two supporters D, E, on which the level rests and turns, are shaped like the letter Y. The telescope rests within the upper part of them; and the inner sides of each of these Y’s are tangents to the cyiindric tube of the telescope, which is turned to a true cylinder, and each side touches it only at one place. The telescope can be confined in the Y’s by means of two jointed arches or rims, ff which fasten with pins, g g, as shown in the figure.

The lower ends of these supporters are inserted into a strong brass bar F G, so as to stand perpendicularly on it. To one of these is applied a fine threaded screw, H, to adjust the tube, when on its supporters, to a true level; and to the same supporter D is sometimes applied a line of tangents as far as ten degrees, in order to take an angle of depression or elevation to that extent. Between the supporters is also sometimes fixed a compass-box I, divided into 360°, and again into four times 90°, having a centre pin and needle, and trigger to throw off the needle from the centre when not used; so as to constitute a perfect circumferentor, connected with all the foregoing improvements. This plate is fixed on a conical brass ferrule, which is adapted to the axis or bell-metal frustum of a cone at top of the brass head of the staves, having a ball and socket, with three bell-metal joints, two strong brass plates LL, four screws eeee, for adjusting the conical axis of the stand to be truly vertical, a regulating screw Μ to the motion on this axis, and a fastening screw N to tighten it on the cone when necessary. The fastening screw N, and the regulating screw Μ, by which the whole instrument is moved steadily round the vertical axis through a small 4 space, were an addition of Mr Ramsden’s. It is to be observed that, since the lower of the two plates LL generally partakes of the inclination of the ground, while the upper should always be level, they are almost never parallel, though usually called “the parallel plates.”

The whole level being now placed steadily on its staves, we must gradually adjust the axis of the stand to be truly vertical, if it is not so already. For this purpose the telescope must be placed in a line with two of the screws e e, and then levelled by these, if-necessary, till the bubble of air in the spirit-tube keeps its position in the middle. It is next to be turned into a line with the other two screws e e at right angles to the former, and to be also levelled in that position.

The horizontal motion on the vertical axis being thus far adjusted, the rims ffoĩ the Y’s are to be opened, the telescope is to be taken off and laid the contrary way upon these supporters. If the bubble of air then rests exactly the same as before, the level and telescope are already adjusted rightly to one another; but if the bubble does not remain the same, the end to which it goes must be noticed, and its position altered; correcting the error partly by the screws c, d, and H, and partly by repeating the adjustments above described, upon the screws e eee.

The intersection of the wires being now directed to any distant object, it may be one of the vanes of the staves or poles hereafter described. (See Levelling Staves.) If they continue to be against it precisely, while the telescope is turned round its axis on its Y’s, it proves, as before mentioned, that the axis coincides with the intersection of the wires. In this easy mode of adjustment consists the excellence of the instrument; for it is hereby capable of being adjusted by only one station and one object, which will at the same time determine it to be in a true level. If, by change of weather, accident, or other cause, the instrument should have lost its level or adjustment, it may thus be readily restored and re-adjusted at the first station; which is an advantage many levelling instruments do not possess.

Since it is often of great importance to execute levelling with accuracy, and the best instrument when out of its adjustment being of little use, it is quite necessary that every person using such an instrument should ∙ have it readily in his power to correct it; and the above, which is Ramsden’s construction, is well adapted for this purpose. There are no doubt simpler instruments, as, for instance, some of Troughton’s; but none of these simple ones admit of anything like such perfect adjustments as the one just described, though they may suit fully as well in the hands of a person not capable of making the adjustments, and of course not capable of taking a nice level at all.

It is well known, that when a plummet or pendulum vibrates freely in a circular arc, the tendency of gravity to bring it to the resting position is everywhere as the sine of the angular distance from that position. Now, if the bubble in the spirit-level moves in a circle, it is obviously acted on by a force precisely similar to that which gravity exerts upon the plummet; and therefore it would seem that a spirit-level should measure small angles with the same accuracy as a sector whose radius is equal to that of the curvature of the glass tube, or a plumb-line of the same length; but there are some causes which diminish its accuracy. When the bubble of air has been brought to the middle of the glass tube, and when the tube, after being deranged, is restored to the very same position, we cannot be sure that the bubble of air will return to the very middle of the tube. This irregularity is produced by the friction of the included liquid against the sides of the tube, and depends on the magnitude of the bubble and the quantity of liquid. In a good level, where the bubble moves about five lines for a minute of inclination, this uncertainty does not exceed half a line, which may be ascertained by pointing the telescope to any object. The coincidence of a plumb-line with a particular mark will, on account of the insensible oscillation of the thread, leave about double the uncertainty which is left by the index of a sector, and which may be estimated at about a hundredth of a line. A variety of interesting researches on this subject by Mr Nixon will be found in the Philosophical Magazine for April and May 1827, March 1829, and June 1831.

Levels are commonly made of glass tubes in the state they are obtained at the glass-house. Of these,, the straightest and most regular are selected and examined, by filling them nearly with spirit of wine, and ascertaining by trial that side at which the bubble moves most regularly, by equal inclinations of the instrument upon a stage called the bubble trier, which is provided with a micrometer screw for that purpose. The most regular side is chosen for the upper part of the instrument, the others being of little consequence to its perfection. Spι∙
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rit of wine is used, because if pure it does not freeze at natural temperatures, and is more fluid than water. Sometimes, indeed, though very rarely, ether is employed. The tube and the bubble must be of considerable length. The longer the bubble, the more sensible it is to a small inclination. A very small bubble is scarcely sensible, appears as if attached to the glass, and moves but slowly.

In the use of a level of this kind constructed by Langlois, it was remarked, that when it was properly set in the cool of the morning, it was no longer so in the middle of the day, or when the weather became hot; and that when it was again rectified for the middle of the day, it became false in the evening, after the heat had diminished. The bubble was much longer in cold than in hot weather, and when longer it was too much so, and could not be kept in the middle of the tube, but stood a little on the ope or the other side, though the inclination was precisely the same. These defects were small, and such as claim the notice of careful observers only; but they appeared of too much consequence not to produce a wish to remedy them. It was observed that they arose from inequalities in the interior surface of the tube; and by examining a great number of tubes, selected for levels of the same kind, there was reason to conclude that all these levels would have more or less of the same defects, because there was not one tube of a regular figure within. They were at best no otherwise cylindrical than plates of glass can be said to be plane before they are ground. The irregularities were easily discernible.

It was therefore concluded that it would be advisable to grind the inner surfaces of the tubes, and give them a regular cylindrical or rather spindle form, of which the two opposite sides should correspond with portions of circles of very long radius. To accomplish this, a rod of iron was taken of twice the length of the glass tube, and on the middle of this rod was fixed a stout tube of brass of the same length as the tube of glass, and nearly filling the bore. The rod was fixed between the centres of a lathe, and the glass gently rubbed on the brass cylinder, with fine emery and water, causing it to move through its whole length. The glass was held by the middle, that it might be equally ground, and was from time to time shifted on its axis, as was also the brass cylinder, in order that the wear might be everywhere alike. The operation had scarcely commenced before the tube broke; and several others experienced the same misfortune, though they had been well annealed. It was supposed that the emery which became fixed in the brass might contribute to split the glass, each grain continuing its impression with the same point, in a straight line, and in some instances might be disposed to cut the glass as diamond. Yet it is curious that some artists find a wooden cylinder to suit pretty well, probably because it does not hold the emery so firmly as brass does. But when a cylinder of glass was substituted instead of the brass, the emery, rolling on the surface of the glass instead of fixing itself, had better success; so that the tube and cylinder touched each other through their whole length. The same operation was continued, using finer and finer emery to smooth the tube, and prepare it for polishing; after which the tube and cylinder having been well washed, thin paper was pasted round the cylinder, and very equally covered with a small quantity of Venice tripoli. The tube was then replaced and rubbed as before, till it had acquired a polish.

A level thus ground may be either of the proper sensibility, or be too much or too little sensible. It will be too sluggish, if, before grinding, exclusive of the inequalities of the tube, its diameter in the middle of the length should much exceed the diameter of the extremities; or it will be too sensible if this diameter should not sufficiently exceed the other; ór, lastly, if the middle diameter be smaller than that of the extremes, the bubble will be incapable of continuing in the middle, but will, in every case, either run to one or the other end, or be divided into two parts.

To correct these defects, and to give the instrument the required degree of perfection, it is proper to examine its figure before the grinding is entirely finished. For this purpose, after cleaning it well, a sufficient quantity of spirit of wine must be put into it, and secured by a cork at each end. The tube must then be placed on the forks or Y’s of a bubble trier, and its sensibility, or the magnitude and regularity of the space run over by the bubble, by equal changes of the micrometer screw, must be ascertained. If the run or spaces passed over be too great, they may be rendered smaller by grinding the tube on a short cylinder; but if they be too short, they may, on the contrary, be enlarged, by grinding on a longer cylinder. It is necessary, therefore, to be provided with a number of these cylinders of the same diameter, but of different lengths, which it is advisable to bring to a first figure, by grinding them in a hollow half cylinder of brass. By means of these it will be easy to regulate the tube of the level to any required degree of sensibility, after which the tube may be very quickly smoothed and polished.

A level thus ground was one foot in length, and so was the cylinder on which it was first worked. When finished it was found to be too sensible. It was therefore worked on another cylinder between nine and ten inches long, which diminished its sensibility so far, that the bubble, which was nine inches and four lines long, at the temperature of 68° Fahrenheit, was carried from the middle of the tube exactly one line for every second of inclination. This sensibility was thought sufficient; but if greater is required, it may be obtained by the process here described. For more on this subject, we again beg to refer to Mr Nixon’s papers already cited.

It may be remarked, that a glass tube is very subject to be split by grinding its inner surface; the same tube will not be endangered by grinding its external surface, even with coarse emery; and when once the polish of the inside is ground off, the danger is over, and coarser emery may be used with safety. Thick glass is more subject to this misfortune than thinner. The coarsest emery used in grinding the tube here spoken of was sufficiently fine to employ one minute in descending three inches in water.