CHAPTER III.
THE NEW STAR OF 1572.
On the evening of the 11th November 1572, Tycho Brahe had spent some time in the laboratory, and was returning to the house for supper, when he happened to throw his eyes up to the sky, and was startled by perceiving an exceedingly bright star in the constellation of Cassiopea, near the zenith, and in a place which he was well aware had not before been occupied by any star. Doubtful whether he was to believe his own eyes, he turned round to some servants who accompanied him and asked whether they saw the star; and though they answered in the affirmative, he called out to some peasants who happened to be driving by, and asked the same question from them. When they also answered that they saw a very bright star in the place he indicated, Tycho could no longer doubt his senses, so he at once prepared to determine the position of the new star. He had just finished the making of a new instrument, a sextant similar to the one he had made for Paul Hainzel, and he was therefore able to measure the distance of the new star from the principal stars in Cassiopea with greater accuracy than the cross-staff would have enabled him to attain.[1] In order to lessen the weight, the instrument was not made of metal, but of well-seasoned walnut-wood, the arms being joined by a bronze hinge, and the metallic arc only 30° in extent, and
- ↑ The sextant is figured and described in Astr. Inst. Progymnasmata, p. 337 et seq.
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