the companion to Polaris may be seen with such an aperture armed with a power of eighty.  As a matter of fact, Dawes, who was, like Burnham, blessed with most acute vision, saw the companion with an instrument no larger than this small one in my hand—­one inch and three-tenths.  Ward saw it with an inch and one-quarter objective, and Dawson with so small an aperture as one inch.  T.T.  Smith has seen it with a reflector stopped down to one inch and one-quarter, while in the instrument still known as the “great Dorpat reflector,” it has been seen in broad daylight.  This historic telescope has, I believe, a twelve inch object glass, but the difficulty of seeing in sunshine so minute a star is such that the fact may fairly be mentioned here.

Another interesting feature is this.  Objects once discovered, though thought to be visible in large telescopes only, may often be seen in much smaller ones.  The first Herschel said truly that less optical power will show an object than was required for its discovery.  The rifts, or canals, in the Great Nebula in Andromeda is a case in point, but two better illustrations may be taken from the planets.  Though Saturn was for many years subjected to most careful scrutiny by skilled astronomers using the most powerful telescopes in existence, the crape ring eluded discovery until November, 1850, when it was independently seen by Dawes, in England, and Bond, in the United States.  Both were capital observers and employed excellent instruments of large aperture, and it was naturally presumed that only such instruments could show the novel Saturnian feature.  Not so.  Once brought to the attention of astronomers, Webb saw the new ring with his three and seven-tenths telescope and Ross with an aperture not exceeding three and three-eighths in diameter.  Nay, I am permitted to say that a venerable member of this society made drawings of it with a three inch refractor.  With a two inch objective, Grover not only saw the crape ring, but Saturn’s belts, as well, and the shadow cast by the ball of the planet upon its system of rings.  Titan, Saturn’s largest moon, is merely a point of light as compared with the planet, as it appears in a telescope, yet it has been seen, so it is said, with a one inch glass.  The shadow of this satellite, while crossing the face of Saturn, has been observed by Banks with a two and seven-eighths objective.  By hiding the glare of the planet behind an occulting bar, some of Saturn’s smallest moons were seen by Kitchener with a two and seven-tenths aperture and by Capron with a two and three-fourths one.  Banks saw four of them with a three and seven-eighths telescope, Grover two of them with a three and three-quarter inch, and four inches of aperture will show five of them, so Webb says.  Rhea, Dione and Tethys are more minute than Japetus, yet Cassini, with his inferior means, discerned them and traced their periods.  Take the instance of Mars next.  It was long believed that Mars had no satellites.