I
went to work patiently and put in the five perpendicular ones besides
the horizontal one, which, like the others, had frizzled up and appeared
to melt away. With another hour's labor I got in the five, when a rude
motion raised them all again and I began over. Just at one o'clock I had
got them all in again. I attempted then to put the diaphragm back into
its place. The sealing-wax was not dry, and with a little jar I sent the
wires all agog. This time they did not come out of the little grooved
lines into which they were put, and I hastened to take out the brass
plate and set them in parallel lines. I gave up then for the day, but,
as they looked well and were certainly in firmly, I did not consider
that I had made an entire failure. I thought it nice ladylike work to
manage such slight threads and turn such delicate screws; but fine as
are the hairs of one's head, I shall seek something finer, for I can see
how clumsy they will appear when I get on the eyepiece and magnify their
imperfections. They look parallel now to the eye, but with a magnifying
power a very little crook will seem a billowy wave, and a faint star
will hide itself in one of the yawning abysses.
"January 15. Finding the hairs which I had put into my instrument not
only too coarse, but variable and disposed to curl themselves up at a
change of weather, I wrote to George Bond to ask him how I should
procure spider lines.
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