The engraving below comes from the 1883 edition of Carpenter's 'The Microscope and Its Revelations.'

The description was as follows:

'Ross's First Class Microscope. - As what is known as the Ross model is still made, being preferred by some purchasers, we shall commence with a notice of the original form of the instrument which has gained so high a celebrity.-The general plan of this Microscope, as shown in Fig. 52, is carried out with the greatest attention to solidity of construction, in those parts especially which are most liable to tremor,as also to the due balancing of the weight ot its different partis upon the horizontal axis. Any inclination mahy be given to it; and it may be fixed in any position by a clamping screw turned by a short lever on the right hand support. The 'fine' adjustment is effected by the milled-head on the transverse arm just behind the base of the 'body;' this acts upon the 'nose' or tube projecting below the arm, wherein the objectives are screwed. the other milled-head, seen at the summer of the stem, serves to secure the transverse arm to this, and may be tightening or slackened at pleasure, so as to regulate the traversing movement of the arm; this movement is allowed only towards the right side, being checked in the opposite by a 'stop,' which secures the coincidence of the axis of the principal 'body' with the center of the stage, and with the axis of the illuminating apparatus beneath it'. The object-platform, to which rectangular traversing motions are given by the two milled heads at the right of the stage, is also made to rotate in the optical axis by a milled head placed underneath the stage on the left-hand side; this turns a pinion which works against a circular rack, whereby the whole apparatus above is carried round about two thirds of a revolution, without in the least disturbing the place of the object, or removing it from the field of the microscope. The graduation of the circular rack, moreover, enables it to be used as a Goniometer. Below the stage, and in front of the stem that carries the mirror, is a dovetail sliding-bar, which is moved up and down by the milled-head shown at its side; this sliding -bar carries what is termed by Mr. Ross the 'Secondary Stage' (shown separately at B), which consists of a tube for the reception of the Achromatic Condenser, Polarizing prisms, and other fittings. to this secondary stage a traversing movement of limited extent is given by means of two screws, one on the front, and the other on the left-hand sideof the frame which carries it, in order that its axis may be brought into perfect conincidence with the axis of the body; and a rotatory movement also is given to it by the turning of a milled-head which is occasionally useful, and the exact amount of which is measured by a graduated circle.-The special advantages of this instrument consist in its general steadiness, in the admirable finish of the workmanship, and in the variety of movements which may be given both to the object and the fittings of the secondary or sub-stage. Its disadvantages consist of the want of portability that necessarily arises from the substantial mode of its construction; and in the liability to tremor in the image, when the highest powers are used, through the want of support to the body along its length....'