You have a building erected and instruments engaged of unrivaled excellence; and it now remains to carry out the suggestion of the Astronomer Royal of England in giving permanency to the establishment. The very distinguished Professors Bache, Pierce, and Gould, state in a letter, which I have been permitted to see, that to expand this institution to the wants of American science and the honors of a national character, will require an investment which will yield annually not less than $10,000; and these gentlemen say, in the letter referred to,—
"If the greatness of your giving can rise to this occasion, as it has to all our previous suggestions, with such unflinching magnanimity, we promise you our earnest and hearty coöperation, and stake our reputation that the scientific success shall fill up the measure of your hopes and anticipations."
For the attainment of an object so rich in scientific reward and national glory, guaranteed by men with reputations as exalted and enduring as the skies upon which they are written, contributions should be general, and not confined to an individual or a place.
For myself, I offer, as my part of the required endowment, the sum of $50,000 in addition to the advances which I have already made; and, trusting that the name which you have given to the Observatory may not be regarded as an undeserved compliment, and that it will not diminish the public regard by giving to the institution a seemingly individual character,
I remain, Gentlemen, your obedient servant,
BLANDINA DUDLEY.
Judge Harris then introduced the Orator of the occasion, Hon. Edward Everett, whose speech is given verbatim in these pages.
THE INSTRUMENTS OF THE DUDLEY OBSERVATORY.
During the Sessions of the American Association, the new Astronomical Instruments of Dudley Observatory were described in detail by Dr. B. A. Gould, who is the Astronomer in charge. We condense his statements:—
The Meridian Circle and Transit instrument were ordered from Pistor & Martins, the celebrated manufacturers of Berlin, by whom the new instrument at Ann Arbor was made. A number of improvements have been introduced in the Albany instruments, not perhaps all absolutely new, but an eclectic combination of late adaptations with new improvements. Dr. Gould made a distinction of modern astronomical instruments into two classes, the English and the German. The English is the massive type; the German, light and airy. The English instrument is the instrument of the engineer; the German, the instrument of the artist. In ordering the instruments for the Albany Observatory, the Doctor preferred the German type and discarded the heavier English. He instanced, as a specimen of the latter, the new instrument at Greenwich, recently erected under the superintendence of the Astronomer Royal. That instrument registers observations in single seconds; the Dudley instrument will register to tenths of seconds. That has six or eight microscopes; this has four. That has a gas lamp, by the light of which the graduations are read off; the Albany instrument has no lamp, and the Doctor considered the lamp a hazardous experiment, affecting the integrity of the experiment, not only by its radiant heat but by the currents of heated air which it produces. The diameter of the object-glass of the Albany instrument is 7½ French inches clear aperture, or 8 English inches, and the length of the tube 8 feet. He would have preferred an instrument in which the facilities of manipulation would have been greater, but was hampered by one proviso, upon which the Trustees of the institution insisted—that this should be the biggest instrument of its kind; and the instruction was obeyed. The glass was made by Chance, and ground by Pistor himself. The eye-piece is fitted with two micrometers, for vertical and horizontal observations. Another apparatus provides for the detection and measurement of the flexure of the tube. Much trouble was experienced in securing a good casting for the steel axis of the instrument. Three were found imperfect under the lathe, and the fourth was chosen; but even then the pivots were made in separate pieces, which were set in very deeply and welded. Dr. Gould said he had been requested by the gentlemen who had this enterprise in charge to suggest, as a mark of respect to a gentleman of Albany who was a munificent patron of Science, that this instrument be known as the Olcott Meridian Circle.