Napoleon’s spyglass. In 1818, three years after Britain exiled him to St. Helena, France’s ex-emperor presented this Galilean telescope with eight draw tubes—more
a fashion accessory designed to fit in the pocket than an instrument for making serious observations—to Captain Francis Stanfell of HMS Phaeton, which was plying the waters around the remote island to disrupt the Atlantic slave trade. (National Maritime Museum, Greenwich )
National Maritime Museum, Greenwich