The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1883-12-19

there for long minutes, his eyes gradu-
ally becoming used to the gloom until
the indistlnct outlines of the dim shape
in front of him gradually resolve them
selves and he sees the famous clock in
all its particulars, his eager eyes
glancing hastily over II and taking IL all
IN. But there is nothing very wonder
fll about the outside of the clock and
one feels a little disappointed at the
twelve or fifteen feet high and eight or
ten broad structure, its front adorned
with rather dim decorations and cut up
with various hooks, crannies, pigeon
holes and galleries and with several
wooden figures five or six inches high
stuck around over it. At one side
stands a tower surmounted by the figure
of n rooster-''ehanticlee the guide
book calls him-and containing the
weights which give motive power to the
whole mechanism. On the front of the
main edifice, some three or four feet
from the ground, are the dials which in
dictate the seconds, minutes, hours, days
of the week and month and the move
ments of the planets.
THE HOUR OF TWELVE.
When the hour of noon comes there
Is q preliminary whirr of'machinery set
gins to strike the four quarters of the
hour. At each stroke of the bell the
figure of an angel raises hammer held
in his right hand and strikes bell held
in the left. At first glance one would
suppose the sounds came from the bell
the angel holds, but this turns out
to be an Illusion, for one soon notices
that the angels hammer does not quite
touch his bell when he makes his stroke,
and that the sound and the stroke do
not quite correspond in time. In short
the angels bell Is q dummy bell and
wooden dummy bell at that. This dis
covery sort of rouses ones suspicious,
and he notices that the angels moYe-
ments are stiff, hesitating and ''wood-
eny," so to speak, and do not at all rep-
resent the movement of a human being,
unless 1t be human being badly stiff
ened by rheumatism. One comes to the
conclusion that the angel is badly in
need of oiling. At the side of the an
gel Is the figure of Genius, which, as
soon as the fourth stroke comes from
the bell, stiffiy and jerkily turns over an
hour-glass and resumes his former i'm
movable position beside it. Higher up
is the figure of Death represented by a
skeleton, and around this skeleton are
grouped figures representing Boyhood,
Youth, Manhood and Old Age-the
four quarters of the hour. The skele-
ton has thigh-bone in his right hand,
and with this bone-the head of it-he
Is supposed to strike the hours upon a
bell at his side, but he really 'doesn't do
anything of the kind. His bell Is also
wooden one and his bone does not reach
the bell by an eighth of an inch when
he aims those slow, hesitating, jerky
blows of his at It. Besides he gets a
little premature once in awhile and
strikes his bell before the real one goes
off; at other times he is little behind
hand and brings his bone down an in.
stant after the real bell has sounded. It
would be superfiuous to say that the
skeleton not only needs greasing but
also regulating.
THE SAVIOR AND HIS APOSTLES.
While the skeleton is going through
with his dumb show and pretending to
strike the twelve strokes Of noon door
at the upper part of the clock suddenly
pops open and a figure of the Savior
appears and moves stiffly and jerkily
forward few inches. Then at the left
hand of this figure another door opens
with a snap aud figure of one of the
Apostles appears. He springs forward /
a few inches, stops as If surprised to find
himself in the presence of so many pro-
fame tourists, hesitates single instant,
as if debating whether to retreat or pt
a bold face on the matter and go ahead,
finally resolves on the latter course.
makes another jerk forward and ad.
vances unstead;ly until opposite the
Savior. Here he makes a full stop,
turns suddenly with snap which would
decapitate living man, faces the
Savior, makes a clumsy movement
which might pass for an obeisance II
one did not know any better, receives
the stiffiy given benediction, jerks him
self around to the left, resumes his halt
ing, rheumatic journey toward an open
door on the Savior's left and disap-
pears. In the meantime another figure
of another Apostle has followed that of
the first, goes through with the same
jerky, uncertain pantomime and takes
his exit in the same rheumatic manner.
So il goes on until all of the Twelve
Apostles have passed in review. Then,
the door having slammed behind the
last Apostle, the figure Of the Savior
raises his wooden arms in very wood
en- way, bestows q blessing on the as
sembled tourists of whom are
sadly in need of n real one-and is
whisked jerkily away. hope that no
one will accuse me of irreverence or
If suggest that it would be
a fine idea to extend the luDricating OF
the figures on the clock so as to take in
at least the Twelve Apostles.
THE CHANTICLEER.
When the figure of the Apostle Peter
appears the chanticleer on the summit
of the weight-tower begins to bestir
himself. He raises his head, ruffles the
feathers on his neck in q very natural
claps his wings over his face
until the whole cathedral re-echoes
with the sound, claps them three sepa-
rate, distinct and deliberate times, and
proceeds to crow. His head goes far
back, his breast protrudes, his beak
opens to its widest extent, his white
his crow from out ''his lofty and shrill-
throat with that peculiar for
ward duck of the head one sees in the
living barnyard champion. Twice does
he repeat his crow, with all the access
sories, and pretty fair sort of crow
it is, too, even If it does sound a little
like the first untutored attempts of the
cockerel. But there is a pecu-
liarity about him which strikes the OBJ
server as being rather queer. He goes
through all the motions, but the crow
does not sound until he is halfway
through, and it continues an instant
after he has resumed his position of re-
pose. In short, the chanticleer is
dummy, too, and his crow comes. not
put of his throat, but from an arrange
ment somewhere within the clock. He
does not need greasing, but little reg
ulating would not hurt him. 1 know |
that it is rank heresy to talk of the IA
nous 'Strasburg clock" in such plain. |
way, but Calfornians are
generally matter-of-fact people, and il |
here ever was a true-born Californian |
n nd ona ,,ro.,I of ha 20 o& hot ono l., tha