Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun An astronomical instrument for observing the passage of a celestial body across the meridian: often used in the same sense as transit-circle, but properly an instrument whose chief object is the determination of the time of transit.
Etymologies
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Examples
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In the transit-room is an eight-feet transit-instrument, with an axis of three feet, resting on two piers of stone: this was made by Bird, but has been much improved by Dolland, Troughton, and others.
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 14, No. 404, December 12, 1829 Various
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More popular in its needs, since its progress now primarily depends upon the interest in, and consequent efforts towards its advancement of the general public; more popular in its nature, because the kind of knowledge it now chiefly tends to accumulate is more easily intelligible -- less remote from ordinary experience -- than that evolved by the aid of the calculus from materials collected by the use of the transit-instrument and chronograph.
A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century Fourth Edition 1874
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