32-1/4 Deg.; Whence It Would Seem
Probable That These Instruments Were Made For Another Locality, And Had
Been Erected At Nanking, Without Reference To Its Position, By Some One
Ill Versed In Mathematical Science.[12]
[Illustration: Observatory Terrace]
[Illustration: Observatory Instruments of the Jesuits.]
"Some years afterwards Father Matteo saw similar instruments at Peking, or
rather the same instruments, so exactly alike were they, insomuch that
they had unquestionably been made by the same artist. And indeed it is
known that they were cast at the period when the Tartars were dominant in
China; and we may without rashness conjecture that they were the work of
some foreigner acquainted with our studies. But it is time to have done
with these instruments." - (Lib. IV. cap. 5.)
In this interesting description it will be seen that the Armillary Sphere
[B] agrees entirely with that represented in illustration facing p. 450.
And the second of his photographs in my possession, but not, I believe,
yet published, answers perfectly to the curious description of the 4th
instrument [D]. Indeed, I should scarcely have been able to translate that
description intelligibly but for the aid of the photograph before me. It
shows the three astrolabes or graduated circles with travelling indexes
arranged exactly as described, and pivoted on a complex frame of bronze;
(1) circle in the plane of the equator for measuring right ascensions; (2)
circle with its axis vertical to the plane of the last, for measuring
declinations: (3) circle with vertical axis, for zenith distances?
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