Pleasures of the telescope / An Illustrated Guide for Amateur Astronomers and a Popular Description of the Chief Wonders of the Heavens for General Readers

This being made, He yearned for worlds to make From other chaos out beyond our night— For to create is still God's prime delight. The large moon, all alone, sailed her dark lake, And the first tides were moving to her might; Then Darkness trembled, and began to quake Big with the birth of stars, and when He spake A million worlds leapt into radiant light. Lloyd Mifflin.


By the introduction of a complete series of star maps, drawn specially for the use of the amateur and distributed through the body of the work, thus facilitating consultation, it is believed that this book makes a step in advance of its predecessors. The maps show all of the stars visible to the naked eye in the regions of sky represented, and, in addition, some stars that can only be seen with optical aid. The latter have been placed in the maps as guide posts in the telescopic field to assist those who are searching for faint and inconspicuous objects referred to in the text. As the book was not written for those who possess the equipment of an observatory, with telescopes driven by clockwork and provided with graduated circles, right ascensions and declinations are not given. All of the telescopic phenomena described are, however, represented in the maps. Star clusters are indicated by a conventional symbol, and nebulæ by a little white circle; while a small cross serves to mark the places where notable new stars have appeared. The relative magnitudes of the stars are approximately shown by the dimensions of their symbols in the maps, the smaller stars being represented by white dots and the larger by star-shaped figures.
In regard to binary stars, it should be remembered that, in many cases, their distances and angles of position change so rapidly that any statement concerning them remains valid only for a few years at the most. There is also much confusion among the measurements announced by different authorities. In general, the most recent measurements obtainable in 1900 are given in the text, but the observer who wishes to study close and rapid binaries will do well to revise his information about them as frequently as possible. An excellent list of double stars kept up to date, will be found in the annual Companion to the Observatory, published in London.