Page:Micrographia - or some physiological descriptions of minute bodies made by magnifying glasses with observations and inquiries thereupon.djvu/34

Rh beside such determinate dimensions, are by certain inconveniences rendred unuseful; for it will be exceeding difficult to make and manage a Tube above an hundred foot long, and it will be as difficult to inlighten an Object less then an hundred part of an inch distant from the Object Glass.

''I have not as yet made any attempts of that kind, though I know two or three wayes, which, as far as I have yet considered, seem very probable, and may invite me to make a tryal as soon as I have an opportunity, of which I may hereafter perhaps acquaint the world. In the Interim, I shall describe the Instrument I even now mention'd, by which the refraction of all kinds of Liquors may be most exactly measur'd, thereby to give the curious an opportunity of making what further tryals of that kind they shall think requisite to any of their intended tryals; and to let them see that the laws of Refraction are not only notional.''

The Instrument consisted of five Rulers, or long pieces placed together, after the manner exprest in the second Figure of the first Scheme, where A B denotes a straight piece of wood about six foot and two inches long, about three inches over, and an inch and half thick, on the back side of which was hung a small plummet by a line stretcht from top to bottom, by which this piece was set exactly upright, and so very firmly fixt; in the middle of this was made a hole or center, into which one end of a hollow cylindrical brass Box C C, fashion'd as I shall by and by describe, was plac'd, and could very easily and truly be mov'd to and fro; the other end of this Box being put into, and moving in, a hole made in a small arm D D; into this box was fastned the long Ruler E F, about three foot and three or four inches long, and at three foot from the above mention'd Centers P P was a hole E, cut through, and cross'd with two small threads, and at the end of it was fixt a small sight G, and on the back side of it was fixt a small Arm H, with a Screw to fix it in any place on the Ruler L M; this Ruler L M was mov'd on the Center B (which was exactly three foot distance from the middle Center P) and a line drawn through the middle of it L M, was divided by a Line of cords into some sixty degrees, and each degree was subdivided into minutes, so that putting the cross of the threads in E upon any part of this divided line, I presently knew what Angle the two Rules A B and E F made with each other, and by turning the Screw in H, I could fix them in any position. The other Ruler also R S was made much after the same manner, only it was not fixt to the hollow cylindrical Box, but, by means of two small brass Armes or Ears, it mov'd on the Centers of it; this also, by means of the cross threads in the hole S, and by a Screw in K, could be fastned on any division of another line of cords of the same radius drawn on N O. And so by that means, the Angle made by the two Rulers, A B and R S, was also known. The Brass box C C in the middle was shap'd very much like the Figure X, that is, it was a cylindrical Box stopp'd close at either end, off of which a part both of the sides and bottomes was cut out, so Rh