thod by which a telescope of sufficient magnifying
power to show living creatures in the moon was constructed by Sir John
Herschel. It had occurred, it would seem, to the elder Herschel to
construct an improved series of parabolic and spherical reflectors
'uniting all the meritorious points in the Gregorian and Newtonian
instruments, with the highly interesting achromatic discovery of
Dolland'(_sic_). [This is much as though one should say that a clever
engineer had conceived the idea of constructing an improved series of
railway engines, combining all the meritorious points in stationary and
locomotive engines, with _Isaac_ Watts' highly ingenious discovery of
screw propulsion. For the Gregorian and Newtonian instruments simply
differ in sending the rays received from the great mirror in different
directions, and Dolland's discovery relates to the ordinary forms of
telescopes with large lens, not with large mirror.] However,
accumulating infirmities and eventually death prevented Sir William
Herschel from applying his plan, which 'evinced the most profound
research in optical science, and the most dexterous ingenuity in
mechanical contrivance. But his son, Sir John Herschel, nursed and
cradled in the observatory, and a practical astronomer from his boyhood,
determined upon testing it at whatever cost. Within two years of his
father's death he completed his new apparatus, and adapted it to the old
telescope with nearly perfect success.' A short account of the
observations made with this instrument, now magnifying six thousand
times, follows, in which most of the astronomical statements are very
correctly and justly worded, being, in fact, borrowed from a paper by
Sir W. Herschel on observation of the moon with precisely that power.

But this great improvement upon all former telescopes still left the
observer at a distance of forty miles from the moon; and at that
distance no object less than about twenty yards in diameter could be
distinguished, and even objects of that size 'would appear only as
feeble, shapeless points.' Sir John 'had the satisfaction to know that
if he could leap astride a cannon-ball, and travel upon its wings of
fury for the respectable period of several millions of years, he would
not obtain a more enlarged view of the more distant stars than he could
now possess in a few minutes of time; and that it would require an
ultra-railroad speed of fifty miles an hour for nearly the livelong
year, to sec