Holmes Stereoscope ‘Stéréoscope à main’

Bellieni’s stere­o­scope is a vari­ant of the Amer­i­can Holmes-Bates stere­o­scope, referred to in France as the “Mex­i­can Stere­o­scope.” The wood­en frame is fit­ted with a detach­able han­dle, and focus is adjust­ed by means of a large rotary wheel on the under­side. The view­er was also avail­able with a stand.
(from: Com­pendi­um of Stereoscopes)

The 1903 Bel­lieni cat­a­log describes this hand-held stere­o­scope as being made of lac­quered card­board, with achro­mat­ic eye­pieces and a rack-and-pin­ion focus­ing mech­a­nism oper­at­ed by a but­ton. Hen­ri Bel­lieni appears to have intend­ed the device for exam­in­ing wet stereo­scop­ic plates direct­ly from the lab­o­ra­to­ry. This use is jus­ti­fied by the dou­ble-claw sys­tem, which sep­a­rates the wet image from the ground-glass screen.
(from: Moulin­ier et al. His­toires de vision­neuses stéréo­scopiques français­es. Limo­ges, 2025, p. 43. Author’s translation.)