Dry compass

Card: Wood covered with paper, white with black markings, graduated to half points and quadrantally in degrees, has decorated E point. There is a 1.5" dia hole at centre of card to accommodate pivot. The whole is in axtremely poor condition, with wood badly warped and paper flaking off.

Needle: Two flat bar needles 1.5" long let into the wood end-on to each other, both in the Northern half of the card. A penny piece of 1861 is let into the wood in the Southern half of the card to balance it. Hence the date of the card [1861]

Pivot: Inverted type, very crude, consisting of a rough wire hoop with pivot cup at top of hoop with bare ends of wire hoop pushed through wood.