Fig. 7.
The combination of three lenses approaches, as has been stated, very close to the object; so close, indeed, as to prevent the use of more than three; and this constitutes a limit to the improvement of the simple microscope, for it is called a simple microscope, although consisting of three lenses, and although a compound microscope may be made of only three or even two lenses; but the different arrangement which gives rise to the term compound will be better understood when that instrument is explained.
Before we proceed to describe the simple microscope and its appendages, it will be well to explain such other points in reference to the form and materials of lenses as are most likely to be interesting.
A very useful form of lens was proposed by Dr. Wollaston, and called by him the Periscopic lens. It consisted of two hemispherical lenses, cemented together by their plane faces, having a stop between them to limit the aperture. A similar proposal was made Mr. Coddington, who, however, executed the project in a better manner, by cutting a groove in a whole sphere, and filling the groove with opaque matter. His lens, which is the well-known Coddington lens, is shown in Fig. 8. It gives a large field of view, which is equally good in all directions, as it is evident that the pencils A A and B B pass through under precisely the same circumstances. Its spherical form has the further advantage of rendering the position in which it is held of comparatively little consequence. It is therefore very convenient as a hand-lens, but its definition is of course not so good as that of a well-made doublet or achromatic lens.
Fig. 8.
Another very useful form of doublet was proposed by Sir John Herschel, chiefly like the Coddington lens, for the sake of a wide field, and chiefly to be used in the hand. It is shown in Fig. 9; it consists of a double convex or crossed lens, having the radii of curvature as 1 to 6, and of a plane concave lens whose focal length is to that of the convex lens as 13 to 5.
Various, indeed innumerable, other forms and combinations of lenses have been projected, some displaying much ingenuity, but few of any practical use. In the Catadioptric lenses the light emerges at right angles from its entering direction, being reflected from a surface cut at an angle of 45 degrees to the axes of the curved surfaces.
