The Sun.
London, England, 1867-03-14 00:00:00

CLOCKS AND WATCHES.

In commenting upon Mr. Wood's entertaining
work on the Curiosities of Clocks and Watches the
Saturday Review gives the following able summary
of all the various means employed from the earliest
period in the measurement of time by water, air,
shadows, sand, fire, and machinery. Unhappily,
the records and monuments of the most primitive
races known to us (says the writer) yield but little
information. Though the gnomon, or sun-dial, cer-
tainly seems to have been in use among the Egyp-
tians, we are not aware of any example of the kind
having been met with in that country. By Herodo-
tus the invention is attributed to the Babylonians.

The earliest actual notice of it we possess is the well-
known one of the sun dial of Ahaz. Its introduction
into Greece is generally attributed to Anaximander.
The dial, 7Witcov, was probably, in its origin, no
more than an upright pillar or staff, the hours being
measured by its shadow, which was marked off
into feet along the ground where the shadow fell.
It was, of course, extremely imperfect as an indi-
cator of time; and it was impossible by it to divide
the day into 12 equal spaces. The 7rolor or
7)XiorpOircov, of which our museums :contaiu several,
was of a more scientific construction. It consisted
of a basin' (XeKauls) of stone or marble, in the
middle of which the staff or index (yvt'ottow) was
erected, throwing its shadow upon six or twelve
meridian lines drawn from it .as a centre to the
circumference of the concave surface. The general
name for instalments, of whatever kind, for mea-
suring time was (.o,3oXOytov (horologium),. whether
it referred to a sun-dial, clepsydra, sand-glass, or
clock. The period of the first introduction
of the clepsydra is not known, but these con-
trivances are said to have been common in
Egypt before they are met with in Greece.
, Mr. Wood has missed the fact that Plato made
himself a night-clock of that sort, and that Bato,
the comic writer, a century later, speaks of them
as in common use, according to Atheineus. The
clepsydra was used in the courts of justice at
Athens to measure the time allowed for speak-
ing, as we learn from the 'amusing pas-
sages in Aristophanes, as well as from allu-
sions by the orators. lts form and construction may
be seen very clearly from a passage in the Problems
of Aristotle. A great improvement was introduced
in the 6poXOrov in3paacK6v of Ctesibius of Alexan-
dria about B.C. 150, which is elaborately described for
oVfirv‘g,aiii
tteru,s.
alut codtmbobinbeoduwraheviele-rmok
o•proilovtiotldt tohe action
utbya
small statue, holding
a wand. The so-called
Temple of the Winds at Athens, besids exhibiting a
dial,appears to have been a clepsydra on a large scale.
The first horologiunz in use at Rome was a sun-dial,
solarium, set up, according to some by Papirius Cur-
sor, B.C. 292 ; according to others, by M. Velerius
Messala, from the booty of Catana, B.C. 263. This
was made for a different meridian, and showed time
very incorrectly. The first dial regulated to the
meridian of Rome was set up by Q. Marcius Phil-
lipus. P. Scipio Nasica in his censorship B.C. 159
established the first public clepsydra. Water-clocks
were in general use in Caesar's time for measuring
the night-watches, and by a law of Cn. Pompeius,
B.C. 52 they were introduced into the' Courts of
home, as at Athens, as a cheek on the speakers. A
kind of water-clock was found in use in Britain by
Caesar, and there is good presumption, from the
arithmetical treatise of one Bhascara Acharya writ-
ten in the 12th century, that they were early used
in India. A wondrous account is given by Abbot

Eginhart, an aye-witness, of the timepiece sent by
Abdalla, Kin;., of Persia, in A.D. 810, or by the
Caliph Harouu al-Raschid in 807, to the Emperer
Charlemagne.
The .caul-'/lass, in which sand took the place of
water, was a modifieation of the clepsydra. These
time-keepers were called clepsanimia. They were in
use before the tune of Jerome, A.D. 331-420. The
candle-clocks of Alfred are well-known. Martinelli
of Spoleto, in a curious work, 1663, speaks of clocks
going by earth, air, fire, and watee. In the.fiec-
clack the motion was produced upon the principle
of a modern smoke-jack, the wheel., being moved by
stwtieheeteeraaeahntios of a lamp,
n
measured
proper
sso
rpbuoeeurriegndiiginbgatyei
tvlrwtevi
orificeinhaeliosch
descent
sal
ell
eisilliotilitti
hegaoeaef
txvauaepibrlNleoNir,csegliigi(og: ttiolo the
ltfeghxceiprna
choclolktiui dial,enorrg
motion
to wheel-work. In 1669 the Grand Duke Cosmo
was astonished to see, at the Royal Society's rooms
in London, a clock the movements of which were
derived from the vicinity of a loadstone. This was
the earliest precursor of the modern electrical clock.
It seems impossible to fix the date when clocks with
wheels and weights were first invented. Boethius is
said to have made one in the year 510 A.D. Pope
Paul I. is reported to have sent a wheelclock to
King Pepin in 756. We are told that the Arabians
first made clocks to strike in 801. Rabanus Manrus
is said to have sent a clock with a 'bell to a friend
about the year 840. The honour of inventing a
wheel-clock is also given to Pacificus, Archdeacon
of Vienna, who died in the middle of the ninth cen-
tury. Gerbert of Fleury, afterwards Pope Sylves-
ter If., has credit for a similar invention about the
year 1,000. It is not clear whether the allusion of
Dante is to a mechanical clock or to a sun-dial, or
whether the orologiarn insigne, given to Sherborne
Abbey by William the Sacrist, in the 12th century, was
of either nature. St. Paul's Cathedral, as evidenced
by the compolus bracerii for A.D. 1256, and its °rola-
giarius-or clock-keeper, and an agreement for alter-
ing and completing the wheel-work of the cloak is
extant in .Norman French, dated Nov. 22, 1311, be-
tween the Dean and Chapter and Walter the " Or-
goner" of Southwark. The great Clock-house at
Westminster was set up by Edward I. iu 1288-9, ont
of a fine of seven thousand marks for corruption and
malpractice levied upon Sir Ralph de Hengham,
Chief Justice of the King's Bench. Another clock-
tower was erected there by Edward 111. in 1365-6.
As we get upon more historical ground, Mr. Wood's
notices multiply with a profusion and a minuteness
tkhich defy selection. There is hardly a timepiece
of any note, either for mechanical ingenuity or
artistic excellence, that he has failed to enumerate
and to describe. The great clOck at Strasburg, a
woodcut of which forms the frontispiece, with its
imitation at Ratisbon, the experiments of Charles
V., the marvels of Italian, French, and Dutch taste,
those of Nuremberg, Venice, and Prague, the dis-
covery of the pendulum, the attempts at perpetual
motion, the idea of a longitude-clock, notices of the
most famous makers, the symbolical functions held
by the clock in the imagery of poets, divines, and
moralists—these are but a few samples taken at ran-
dom from the mass of curious lore which the writer
has to offer for the entertainment of his readers.
Then comes the history of watches, or portable time
pieces. The origin of the watch, though not readily
to be assigned to any particular date, is certainly
not of the same antiquity as that of the fixed or sta-
tionary clock. The first step towards it was obvi-
ously the invention of a coiled spring, as the mo-
tive power, insi cad of a weight and pendulum. And
this appears to have been made during the last quar-
ter of the 15th century. Nuremberg has generally
had the credit of the earliest pocket clocks"—
Nuremberg eggs, as they were called from thAr
oval shape. The same honour has been claimed by
Blois, upon less plausible grounds. Even China is
said to have introduced the invention into Germany,
whence it passed into France, and so into England.
Peter Hele, of Nuremberg, who died iu 1540, as
early as 1490 made small watches of steel, which
pointed out and struck the hours, and might be
worn on the person. By the year 1500 the manu-
facture was so far improved as to describe seconds
of time, at'which period such watches were used for
astronomical purposes by George Purbach, a ma-
thematician of Vienna. In 1544 the guild of Mas-
ter Clockmakers in Paris secured from Francis I.
the exclusive privilege of making clocks and watches,
both large and, small. Our own Clockmakers'
Company was incorporated by charter of Charles I.
1631.

The performance of these early specimens of the
watchmaker's art was, we may suppose, very im-
perfect. About the year 1650 metallic chains were
commonly substituted for the catgut cord previously
in general use. A great improvement was intro-
duced in the year 1658 by the invention of the spiral
or pendulum spring applied to the arbor of the
balance. The first idea of this spring is attributed
to the ingenius mathematician, Dr. Hooke. It was
thoroughly carried out in 1665, under his directions,
by the celebrated watchmaker, Thomas Tompion.
A watch of that kind made for Charles 11. bears
that date, together with the names of both inventor
and crnstructor. A rival claim to the invention was
indeed set up by Huyghens, and also by a French-
man, Jean Hauteville, who was born at Orleans in
1647, and died iu 1724. But the priority seems
fairly to rest with our own country, as does also the
addition of the minute hand ; for, until nearly the
close of the seventeenth century, watches had only
one band—namely, that which pointed to the hours.
This improvement is said to have been made
by Daniel Quare, a Quaker, and a famous clock-
maker of that period. Many old watches were then
altered to receive the spiral springs, with the addi-
tional hand, and other improvements. The first
repeater was made by Quare in 1676. In 1680
Clement, a Londoner, invented the anchor-escape-
ment, and in 1695 Tompion gave the idea of the
cylinder escapement, which plan was not, however,
brought into use till the following century. To
Brequet is due the touch watch, or montre (le touche,
for night use or for the blind. To Nicolas Faccio,
of Duillcr, who was born at Geneva or Basle, Feb-
ruary 16, 1664, belongs the merit of having first
applied the art of piercing rubies to receive the
pivots of the balance-wheel about the year 1700.
Faccio was a clever inventor and a good scholar,
who got himself into the pillory by dabbling in the
quackeries and sham prophecies set on foot by a
clique of Frenchmen about that time. The horizontal
et no t
whome d
we
e 724 are byal
also
indebtedon i o n 's
foraopvrteehnmet
eiescapementcn et
's mercurialcwasGraham,y erlli nao
Graham's i
tiro enns ot
fi
clocks.odtneha edp
-me
The
edhaauett
valuableul
emv
escapemente r
iandsothe
only
dead-beattph e
application escapement,o of
to a watch. The inventions of Graham and Harri-
son gave to English watches a pre-eminence over
those of every other country, and led to many
spurious imitations abroad. One. of the msc-icrouotip:esnbuau
push
esisfanith;aoauiattrfttenciring,
singu-
lar freaks of the art was the lilliputian repealer, no
11.
s
he
ibsfAp was.
Arnold,
olgsi
o7etnme
In6ri,eailt4iedt,doohebi
tfanfaitoupoorrlurveaeGihvf:silver
which
rrot
etir2hstgilacxxe
hlvste
rrpipsytinl en,
simple
bslpinynstr7rpuyi
Strand.
piece,hnig4snedo gl11.)
sy,ti
ntuapue, set-in
watchesn
u but
b .vasou
t
the fusee. It required no winedpi
repeater. ktiniaotb,pleikrieodthetisietrtivnpgesrpyrionfg
of
a wearingr
came into Vogue, and was speedily followed by the
ladies. To avoid expense, however,
a dummy, or
fausse montre, of some showy material often took
the place of a real one. In Paris all sorts of whim-
sical toys were turned out by Julien le Roy, entitltd
etrennes clironcimetriques ; and he was even outdone
in this line by J. B. Baillon, horologier de la mine,
who, by falling in with the luxurious and wasteful
fashions of the Court, died the richest watchmaker
in Europe. Mr. Wood's pages contain an ample
catalogue of instances in which the skill and taste

Dr. Frankland has analysed specimens of the
water of each London company during the month
of February. In 100,000 parts he found in the
various waters foreign substances, ranging from 2 9
to 40 parts of solid matter, while the hardness
ranged from 16 in the Lambeth to 23 in the Kent
waters. Dr. Frankland has also determined the
amount of organic carbon, and of combined nitrogen
in the respective waters, and has estimated the se-
veral amounts or its equivalents from which the
changed organic matters were taken originally.
In reference to the question reported in the news-
papers, whether it was the intention of her Majesty's
Government to introduce any measure tending to
obviate the loss consequent on the theory of infec-
tion, the Secretary of State, Mr. Walpole, answered
in the negative. Should any such measure ever be
introduced, it must be extended as to obviate such
losses both of life and property as have been sus-
tained by the people of East London. The principle
of compensation applied to the accidents of railway
companieS may probably admit of useful extension
to fatal accidents of another kind.

The annual rate of mortality last week was 24 per
1,000 in London, 27.iu Edinburgh, 31 in Dublin,
24 in Bristol, 23 in •Birmingham, 33 in Liver-
pool, 30 in Manchester, 31 in Salford, 29 in Shef-
field, 29 in Leeds, 18 in Hull, 30 in Newcastle-upon-
Tyne, and 32 in Glasgow. The rate in Vienna was
30 per 1,000 during the week ending •the 2(.1
when the mean temperature was 2.5 (leg. Fahrenheit
lower than iu the same week in London, where the
rate was 22.

At the Royal Obsery ►tory, Greenwich, the mean
height of the barometer in the week was 29.774 in.
The barometrical reading decreased from 30.59 in.
at the beginning of week to 29-20 in. by the end of
the week. The mean temperature of the air in the
week was 35.3 deg., which is 4 9 deg. below the
average of the same week in 50 years (as deter-
mined by Mr. Glsisher). The highest day tem-
perature was 48.7 deg. on Tuesday. The lowest
night temperature was 27.6 deg. on Sunday. The
entire range of temperature in the week was, there-
fore, 211 deg. The mean of the highest tempera-
tures of the water of the Thames was 40.6 deg. ;
that of the lowest was 38.0 deg. The difference
between the mean dew-point temperature and air
temperature was 4.4 deg. The mean degree of
humidity of the air was 84, complete saturation be-
ing represented by 100. Rain fell to the amount of
0.52 in., of which 0.34 in. fell on S.►turday. Ac-
cording to a return furnished by the engineer of the
Metropolitan Board of Works, the average daily
quantity of sewage pumped into the river Thames
at the southern outfall works, Crossness, was
46,386,468 gallons, or 210,755 cubic metres, equi-
valent to about as many tons by weight.