The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1889-10-04
BADLY sOARFD BY A WATCH.
SERVANTS THOUGHT THE T1MEPIECE WAS
THE ABODE OF WITCHES.

ed when, in 1880, he provided himself
with silver watch of the regulation
size and style. CHANGING to stop with
a neighbor over night, and it bein :
somewhat cold be laid the watch near
his body and covered it with the bed
quilts, 80 that the chilly weather would
not affect the works. Next morn
ing he arose rather abruptly and
left the house without removing his
treasure from its cosy nest in the bed.
In fixing up the room the servant
discovered ''the Internal chattering
thing" and Immediately concluded it
must be the old doctors familiar
spirit" conclusions which she hardly
arrived at before she had flee wildly
from thereon. Other servants were
called and the whole array charged the
''chattering thing" in the bed Clubs
aud tongs were freely used, but the
case was strong and the thing chatter
ed defiautly. One of the girls, more
courageous than the Others, finally
agreed that she would take the tongs
and carry the thing to the moat and
drown it, proceeding fraught with
danger but at last decided upon. The
others followed at a respectable dis
tance with hoes, clubs and shovels,
with which they proposed TO pounce
on the thing should it attempt to a.
tack the heroic girl. When the old
doctor returned for his watch he was
informed of what had been done, one
of the servants leading the way to
where the thing had been drowned.
1t was found hanging on a bush on
the bank of the moat. The failure to
beat or drown the thing to death
fully convinced the servants that il
was in reality the old wizards spirit,
and they could not be pursuaded to
touch it.
The story is related to show what
rarities watches must have been even
at that late period of the seventeenth
century.
In 1896 one of tho q1mirers of Geo
III. caused to be made for that mon
arch a watch which was a marvel in
its way. 1t had a calender hand
which pointed to the days of the
month and year. Instead Of making
a revolution every month, like calendar
watches of to-day, it took the whole
365 days to get once around. The
dial-plate was only two inches in diam
eter, therefore the figures must have
been very minute, otherwise the 36j
numerals could not have been arran5-
ed around the border.
The annual dial-calendar was but
one of a number of extras with which
this watch was provided. A movable
diamond performed diurnal revolutions
as regularly as did the great orb afteI
which it was modelled; it struck tho
hours, the half hours and the quarters
while an inside dial plate revolved il
manner clearly exhibiting the varia
tions of the seasons.
The English House of Commons
following a suggestion of Sir lssa'
Newton. appointed a committee Jun,
II, 17l4 with power to offer reward
of f5O,OO0 to any one who would in
vent an accurate time-keeper for use a
sea in deter mining longitude. Aite
many years of labor and study the in
vention was announced as perfected
However, the inventor, one John Har
rison, did not receive the reward TO
his labor until Sept IA. 1854.
Keyless watches have been knowr
for the past 100 years, but not unit
within the past twenty five have tie.
come into general use.
1t would take columns to enumeratt
all the dainty and wonderful littl'
timepieces that have been made during
the past 200 years. They have beer
made no larger than peas, and set i'll
rings for physicians to facilitate the
counting OF the pulse. They hav,
been fixed in bracelets, brooches, eye
glasses, tops OF umbrella-handles an(
even on the ends of lead pencils, wher,
they occupy the same position as The
rubber on the average Faber.
| In 1883 a matchmaker of Dresden
exhibited a watch made entirely o
paper. The paper was chemically pre-
pared and the maker claimed that i
would be as serviceable as if made o
the material ordinarily used.
The same year at fair held a
Worcestershire, England, Crowthe
Bros, S Co. exhibited one made entire
| ly of iron.
| An ingenious prisoner at Kariaus
Bohemia, recently constructed watct
eight centimeters in diameter, with II,
other tools or material except tw
needles, a spool of thread, a nnwspape
and some rye straw. The wheels
posts, and cogs are all made of ry
straw, which it is well known is quit
coarse and tough. 1t runs six hour
without winding and Leeps good time
1t is now in pl session IF the prefec
of Kaliaus, who 6 it the grea
est marvel of the nineteenth century
The most ingenious, perfect an
complex watch ever manufactured wa
, sent out from the works of Patel
Philippe ~ Co, of Geneva, Switza,
land, in July, 1887, and is now in po.
, session of Baron Nicholas. 1t
, what is known as the full-size
"hunter." On one side there is a dii
, of the regulation kind, exhibiting tn
hour, minute and second hands ais
an independent chronograph han
} which marks the fifth of seconds. Tt
= same dial has repeating mechanis,
5 which strikes the hours, quarters an
t minutes.
e The opposite dial has hands pointir
A to the months, weeks and day
n Another large central hand on tn
r dial, If set at the beginning of ea'
n year correctly points to all moo
: phases and also acts as perpetual ca
v endar. 1t is so constructed rs to p,
y NIT of it's keeping two different time
say standard on one side and sun tin
on the other,