The Toposcope

In the loftiest tower in the city of Vienna there is a novel instrument, known as the toposcope, eonstantly attended day and night, for the purpose of locating fires. It consists of a good telescope, which is solidly attached to an arrangement of levers, while graduated sections of a circle are arranged horizontally and vertically in such a way that the moving of the telescope sideways or up or down resul ts in a change of position of the hands attached to the levers in reference to the graduated scales. Thus, the stability of the apparatus being assured by the firmness of the fastening, whenever the telescope is focused upon the same object the hands will point to the same figures on the horizontal and on the vertical sextant, and since an index of the whole city has been made it is but a matter of a few seconds, when a glare is discovered at night, to direct upon the spot the toposcope on the side, to read off the numbers, to look up the object and to telegraph to the central station the details observed. Local conditions are, of course, necessary for the successful oppration of such au apparatus, but in this case they are said to be almost perfect. The tower is over 500 feet high, and an uuinterrupted view of the great area of the city is thus possible to the watchnian if the atniospheric conditions are favorable.