Hello
Saturday , 6 of February , I made observations again with the one foot refractor of 15mm aperture F/ 32 at 9x / built in Keplerian ocular.
I started with Messier 41 in Canis Major were I saw four stars out of about one hundred in this cluster.
The most conspicious of the four visible stars is a red giant of spectral class K3.
Comparing my drawing with the Toshimi Taki-Wehner ''Double Star Atlas'' I recognised the star located at South-East as being 12 Canis Majoris and a pair of stars located to the West of the cluster.
The four stars visible with direct vision were seen immersed in a well visible haze of light , an indication of the many stars not resolved by the small telescope.
At Pleiades I counted 30 stars , this being the best star counting yet made with the primeval refractor.
You remember a triangular asterism consisting of three stars close to the brightest star in Pleiades ,which is Alcyone.
To my delight , the brightest star in that asterism was visible also .
In the ''Praesepe '' M44 star cluster I counted 18 stars and a translucent glow showed there should be more ,unseen stars.
Next was on the list Messier 37 in Auriga ,seen as an hazy object ,without clear shape and structure except a slightly brighter center.
However ,with averted vision , the core of the cluster seem to be brighter on the S-W to N-E direction.
Latter , when I visited the same cluster with the 60 x 828 mm refractor I learned that brightening of the core was due to two bright stars.
On every occasion , when I;m rambling through the clusters of Auriga , I don't forget to pay tribute to Giovanni Hodierna.
In a time when for most astronomers to observe the Great Nebula in Orion seemed something awesome, Hodierna discovered scores of Deep Sky objects.
The only one telescope used by him we know about is a Galilean refractor with a magnification of 20x.
https://en.wikipedia...ttista_Hodierna
http://messier.seds....r/hodierna.html
Many of his deep-sky objects proved to be just asterisms and others are impossible to identify with certainty.
But 20 highly celebrated deep-sky objects ,if not 25 , were discovered by Hodierna.
Of the ones observed by me on Saturday , Messier 41 , Messier 45 , Messier 44 and Messier 37 were all discovered or listed for the first time as deep-sky objects by Giovanni Hodierna.
This seem natural to me .
And this is the reenactment purpose for which I built and use such small singlet telescopes.
I had a look also to Jupiter were I noticed two Galilean satellites to the East of the planet.
One dimmer ,at two Jovian diameters distance , was Ganymede.
One slightly brighter , at about seven Jovian diameters distance was Callisto.
Clear sky to all , Mircea