now contented itself with a simple clockwork to tell the hours. Some
had a stroke for the hours, and some had chimes; the one showed single
characteristic moving figures, while others were provided with great
astronomical works, showing the day of the week, month, and year, the
phases of the moon, the course of the planets, and the signs of the
zodiac.
On the town clock of Compiègne, which was built in 1405, three figures
of soldiers, or "jaquemarts," so-called (in England they are called
"Jacks"), struck the hour upon three bells under their feet; and they
are doing it still. The great clock of Dijon has a man and a woman
sitting upon an iron framework which supports the bell upon which they
strike the hours. In 1714 the figure of a child was added, to strike
the quarters. The most popular of the mechanical figures was the cock,
flapping his wings and crowing.
The clock on the Aschersleben Rathaus shows, besides the phases of the
moon, two pugnacious goats, which butt each other at each stroke of the
hour; also the wretched Tantalus, who at each stroke opens his mouth
and tries to seize a golden apple which floats down; but in the same
moment it is carried away again. On the Rathaus clock in Jena is also a
representation of Tantalus, opening his mouth as in Aschersleben; but
here the apple is not present, and the convulsive efforts of the figure
to open the jaws wide become ludicrous.
One of the first clocks with which important astronomical works were
connected is that of the Marienkirche in Lübeck, now restored. Below,
at the height of a man's head, is the plate which shows the day of the
week, month, etc.; these calculations are so reliable that the extra
day of leap-year is pushed in automatically every four years. The plate
is more than three meters in diameter. Above it is the dial, almost as
large. The numbers from 1 to 12 are repeated, so that the hour-hand
goes around the dial only once in twenty-four hours. In the wide space
between the axis which carries the hand and the band where the hours
are marked, the fixed stars and the course of the planets are
represented. The heavens are here shown as they appear to an observer
in Lübeck. In the old works the movement of the planets was given
incorrectly, for they all were shown as completing a revolution around
the sun in 360 days. Of course this is absurd. Mercury, for example,
revolves once around the sun in eighty-eight days, while Saturn
requires twenty-nine years and 166 days for one revolution. When this
astronomical clock was repaired, some years ago, a very complicated
system of wheels had to be devised to reproduce accurately the great
difference in the movement of the planets. The work consumed two years.
There are a great number of moving figures on the Lübeck clock, but
they are not of the most conspicuous interest. In spite of this,
however, they excite more wonder among the crowds of tourists who are
always present when the clock strikes twelve than the really remarkable
and admirable astronomical and calendar works.
The Strassburg clock has, more than all others, an actually world-wide
fame; and no traveler who visits the beautiful old city fails to see
the curious and interesting spectacle which it offers daily at
noontime. To quote from one such visitor: "Long before the clock
strikes twelve, a crowd has assembled in the high-arched portico of the
stately cathedral, to be sure of not missing the right moment. Men and
women of both high and low degree, strangers and townspeople alike,
await in suspense the arrival of the twelfth hour. The moment
approaches, and there is breathless silence. An angel lifts a scepter
and strikes four times upon a bell; another turns over an hour-glass
which he holds in the hand. A story higher, an old man is seen to issue
from a space decorated in Gothic style; he strikes four times with his
crutch upon a bell, and disappears at the other side, while the figure
of Death lets the bone in its hand fall slowly and solemnly, twelve
times, upon the hour-bell. In still another story of the clock, the
Saviour sits enthroned, bearing in the left hand a banner of victory,
the right hand raised in benediction. As soon as the last stroke of the
hour has died away, the apostles appear from an opening at the right
hand of the Master. One by one they turn and bow before Him, departing
at the other side. Christ lifts His hand in blessing to each apostle in
turn, and when the last has disappeared, He blesses the assembled
multitude. A cock on a side tower flaps his wings and crows three
times. A murmur passes through the crowd, and it disperses, filled with
wonder and admiration at the spectacle it has witnessed."
In 1574, the Strassburg astronomical clock replaced the older one. It
was mainly the work of Dasypodius, a famous mathematician, and it ran
until 1789. Later, the celebrated clock-maker, Johann Baptist Schwilgué
(born December 18, 1772), determined to repair it. After endless
negotiations with the church authorities, he obtained the contract, and
on October 2, 1842, the clock, as made over, was solemnly reconsecrated.
In very recent days, the clock of the City Hall in Olmütz, also
renovated, has become a rival to that of the Strassburg Cathedral. In
the year 1560, it was described by a traveler as a true marvel,
together with the Strassburg clock and that of the Marienkirche in
Dantzic. But as the years passed, it was most inconceivably neglected,
and everything movable and portable about it was carried off. Now,
after repairs which have been almost the same as constructing it anew,
it works almost faultlessly. In the lower part of the clock is the
calendar, with the day of the year, month, and week, and the phases of
the moon, together with the astronomical plate; a story higher, a large
number of figures move around a group of angels, and here is also a
good portrait of the Empress Maria Theresa. Still higher is an
arrangement of symbolical figures and decorations, which worthily
crowns the whole. A youth and a man, above at the left, announce the
hours and quarters by blows of a hammer. The other figures go through
their motions at noonday. Scarcely have the blows of the man's hammer
ceased to sound, when a shepherd boy, in another wing of the clock,
begins to play a tune; he has six different pieces, which can be
alternated. As soon as he has finished, the chimes, sixteen bells,
begin, and the figures of St. George, of Rudolph of Hapsburg, with a
priest, and of Adam and Eve, appear in the left center. When they have
disappeared, the chimes ring their second melody, and the figures of
the right center appear,--the three Kings of the East, before the
enthroned Virgin, and the Holy Family on the Flight into Egypt. When
the bells ring for the third time, all the figures show themselves once
more.
Clocks operated by electricity are, of course, the product of recent
times.
England's largest electric clock was, as our illustration shows,
recently christened in a novel manner. The makers, Messrs. Gent & Co.,
of Leicester, entertained about seventy persons at luncheon on this
occasion, using one of the four mammoth dials as a dining-table, a
"time table," as the guests facetiously styled it.
The clock was installed, 220 feet above the ground, in the tower of the
Royal Liverpool Society's new building, in Liverpool. Each of the four
dials, which weigh fifteen tons together, measure twenty-five feet in
diameter, with a minute-hand fourteen feet long. The hands are actuated
electrically by a master clock connected with the Greenwich
Observatory. After dark, they are illuminated by electricity, and are
visible at a great distance.
Still larger are the dials of the great electric clock, situated 346
feet high, in the tower of the Metropolitan Life Building, on Madison
Square, New York City. They measure twenty-six and one half feet in
diameter. The minute-hand is seventeen feet from end to end, and twelve
feet from center to point, while the hour-hand measures thirteen feet
four inches in all, and eight feet four inches from the center of the
dial outward. These immense hands are of iron framework, sheathed in
copper, and weigh 1000 and 700 pounds respectively.
The big clock and the ninety-nine other clocks in the building are
regulated from a master clock in the Directors' Room, on the second
floor, which sends out minute impulses, and is adjusted to run within
five seconds per month.
At night, the dial, hands, and numerals are beautifully illuminated, of
which we present a picture, the enlarged minute-hand showing the length
of exposure. The time is also flashed all night in a novel manner from
the great gilded "lantern" at the apex of the tower, 696 feet above the
pavement. The quarter-hours are announced from each of the four faces
of the lantern by a single red light, the halves by two red flashes,
the three quarters by three flashes. On the hour, the white arc-lights
are extinguished temporarily, and white flashes show the number of the
hour.
This takes the place of the bells operated in the daytime. They are in
four tones, G (1500 pounds), F (2000 pounds), E flat (3000 pounds), and
B flat (7000 pounds), and each quarter-hour ring out the "Westminster
Chimes," in successive bars. These are the highest chimes in the world,
being situated on the forty-second floor, 615 feet above the street
level; and they attract much attention from visitors.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
MOTORING THROUGH THE GOLDEN AGE--PART I
BY ALBERT BIGELOW PAINE
It was some time in June when we found ourselves drifting about
Normandy in our motor-car, and one peaceful evening we came to Bayeux
and stopped there for the night. Bayeux, which is about sixty miles
from Cherbourg, was intimately associated with the life of William the
Conqueror, and is to-day the home of the famous Bayeux tapestry, a
piece of linen two hundred and thirty feet long and eighteen inches
wide, on which is embroidered in colored wool the story of William's
conquest of England.
William's queen, Matilda, is supposed to have designed this marvelous
pictorial document, and even executed it, though probably with the
assistance of her ladies. Completed in the eleventh century, it would
seem to have been stored in the Bayeux cathedral, where it lay,
scarcely remembered, for a period of more than six hundred years. Then
attention was called to its artistic and historic value, and it became
still more widely known when Napoleon brought it to Paris and exhibited
it at the Louvre. Now it is back in Bayeux, and has a special room in
the museum there and a special glass case so arranged that you can walk
around it and see each of its fifty-eight tableaux.
Matilda was ahead of her time in art. She was a futurist--anybody could
see that who had been to one of the recent exhibitions. But she was
exactly abreast in the matter of history. It is likely that she
embroidered the events as they were reported to her, and her records
are beyond price to-day. I suppose she sat in a beautiful room with her
maids about her, all engaged at the great work, and I hope she looked
as handsome as she looks in the fine painting that hangs above the case
containing her masterpiece.
It was the closing hour when we got to the Bayeux museum, but the
guardian generously gave us plenty of time to walk around and look at
all the marvelous procession of horses and men, whose outlines have
remained firm and whose colors have stayed fresh for more than eight
hundred years. There is something fine and stirring about Matilda's
tapestry. No matter if Harold does seem to be having an attack of
pleurisy, when he is only putting on his armor, or if the horses appear
to have detachable legs. I could see that the Joy, who is a judge of
horses, did not think much of Queen Matilda's drawing, and their riders
were not much better. Still, it was wonderful how they did seem to "go"
in some of the battles, and they made that old story seem very real to
us. Tradition has it that the untimely death of Matilda left the
tapestry unfinished, for which reason William's coronation does not
appear.
Next day, at Caen, we visited Matilda's tomb, in a church which she
herself founded. Her remains have never been disturbed. We also visited
the tomb of the Conqueror, on the other side of the city at the church
of St. Etienne. But the Conqueror's bones are not there now; they were
scattered by the Huguenots in 1562.
We enjoyed Caen. We wandered about among its ancient churches and still
more ancient streets. At one church a wedding was going on, and
Narcissa and I lingered a little, to assist. One does not get invited
to a Normandy wedding every day, especially in the old town where
William I organized his followers to invade England. No doubt this
bride and groom were descendants of some of William's wild Normans, but
they looked very mild and handsome and modern, to us.
Caen became an important city under William the Conqueror. Edward III
of England captured and pillaged it about the middle of the fourteenth
century, at which time it was larger than any city in England, except
London. To-day, Caen has less than fifty thousand inhabitants, and is
mainly interesting for its art treasures and its memories.
Our travel program included Rouen, Amiens, and Beauvais, cathedral
cities lying more to the northward. It was at Rouen that we started to
trace backward the sacred footsteps of Joan of Arc, saint and savior of
France. For it is at Rouen that the pathway ends. When we had visited
the great cathedral, whose fairylike façade is one of the most
beautiful in the world, we drove to a corner of the old market-place
and stopped before a bronze tablet which tells that on this spot on a
certain day in May, 1431 (it was the 29th), a young girl who had saved
her country from an invading and conquering enemy was burned at the
stake. That was five hundred years ago, but time has not dulled the
tragedy of the event, its memory of suffering, its humiliation. All
those centuries since, the nation that Joan saved has been trying to
atone for her death. Streets have been named for her and statues have
been set up for her in public squares all over France.
There is little in Rouen to-day that Joan saw. The cathedral was there
in her time, but she was never permitted to enter it. There is a wall
which was a part of the chapel where she had her final hearing before
her judges; there are some houses which she must have passed, and there
is a tower which belonged to the castle in which she was imprisoned,
though it is not certain that it is Joan's tower. There is a small
museum in it, and among its treasures we saw the manuscript article
"St. Joan of Arc," by Mark Twain, who, in the "Personal Recollections,"
has left to the world the loveliest picture of that lovely life.
It was our purpose to leave Rouen by the Amiens road, but when we got
to it and looked up a hill that, about half-way to the zenith, arrived
at the sky, we decided to take a road that led off toward Beauvais. We
could have climbed that hill well enough, and I wished later we had
done so. As it was, we ran along pleasantly during the afternoon, and
attended evening services in an old church at Grandvilliers, a place
that we had never heard of before, but where we found an inn as good as
any in Normandy.
It is curious with what exactness fate times its conclusions. If we had
left Grandvilliers a few seconds earlier or later, it would have made
all the difference, or if I had not pulled up a moment to look at a
lovely bit of brookside planted with poplars, or if I had driven the
least bit slower or the least bit faster during the first five miles;
or--
Oh, never mind--what happened was this: we had just mounted a long
steep hill on high speed and I had been bragging of the car,--always a
dangerous thing to do,--when I saw ahead of us a big two-wheeled cart
going in the same direction as ourselves, and, beyond it, a large car
approaching. I could have speeded up and cut in ahead of the cart, but
I was feeling well, and I thought I should do the courteous thing, the
safe thing. So I fell in behind it. Not far enough behind, however, for
as the big car came opposite, the sleepy driver of the cart awoke,
pulled up his horse short, and we were not far enough behind for me to
get the brakes down hard and suddenly enough to stop before we touched
him. It was not a smash--it was just a push. But it pushed a big hole
in our radiator, smashed up one of our lamps, and crinkled up our left
mud-guard. The radiator was the worst. The water poured out. Our car
looked as if it had burst into tears.
We were really stupefied at the extent of our disaster.
The big car at once pulled up to investigate and console us. The
occupants were Americans, too, from Washington--kindly people who
wanted to shoulder some of the blame. Their chauffeur, a Frenchman,
bargained with the cart driver who had wrecked us to tow us to the next
town, where there were garages. Certainly, pride goes before a fall.
Five minutes earlier we were sailing along in glory, exulting over the
prowess of our vehicle. Now, all in the wink of an eye, our precious
conveyance, stricken and helpless, was being towed to the hospital, its
owners trudging mournfully behind.
The village was Poix; and if one had to be wrecked anywhere, I cannot
think of a lovelier spot for disaster than Poix de la Somme. It is just
across in Picardy, and the river Somme is a little brook that ripples
and winds through poplar-shaded pastures, sweet meadows, and deep
groves. In every direction are the loveliest walks, with landscape
pictures at every turn. The village itself is drowsy, kindly,
simple-hearted. The landlady at our inn was a large, motherly soul
that, during the week of our stay, the Joy learned to love, and I to be
grateful to.
For the others did not linger. Paris was not far away, and had a good
deal to recommend it. The new radiator ordered from London might be
delayed. So, early next morning they were off for Paris by way of
Amiens and Beauvais, and the Joy and I settled down to such employments
and amusements as we could find while waiting for repairs. We got
acquainted with the garage man's family, for one thing. They lived in
the same little court with the shop, and we exchanged Swiss French for
their Picardese and were bosom friends in no time. We spruced up the
car, too, and every day took long walks, and every afternoon took some
luncheon and our spirit-stove and followed down the Somme to a little
bridge and there made our tea. Then, sometimes, we read; and once, when
I was reading aloud from "Joan of Arc" and had finished the great
battle of Patay, we suddenly remembered that it had happened on the
very day on which we were reading, the eighteenth of June.
How little we guessed that in such a short time our peaceful little
river would give its name to a battle a thousand times greater than any
that Joan ever fought!
One day I hired a bicycle for the Joy, and entertained the village by
pushing her around the public square until she learned to ride alone.
Then I hired one for myself, and we went out on the road together.
About the end of the third day we began to look for our radiator, and
visited the express-office with considerable regularity. Presently the
village knew us, why we were there, and what we were expecting. They
became as anxious about it as ourselves.
One morning, as we started toward the express-office, a man in a wagon
passed and called out something. We did not catch it; but presently
another met us, and, with a glad look, told us that our goods had
arrived and were now in the delivery wagon on the way to the garage. We
did not recognize either of those good souls, but they were interested
in our welfare. Our box was at the garage when we arrived there. It was
soon opened and the new radiator in place. The other repairs had been
made, and once more we were complete. We decided to start next morning
to join the others in Paris.
Morning comes early on the longest days of the year, and we had eaten
our breakfast, had our belongings put into the car, and were ready to
be off by seven o'clock. What a delicious morning it was! Calm,
glistening, the dew on everything. As long as I live I shall remember
that golden morning when the Joy, age eleven, and I went gipsying
together, following the winding roads and byways that led us through
pleasant woods, under sparkling banks, and along the poplar-planted
streams of Picardy. We did not keep to highways at all. We were in no
hurry, and we took any lane that seemed to lead in the right direction,
so that much of the time we appeared to be crossing fields--fields of
flowers, many of them, scarlet poppies, often mingled with blue
corn-flowers and yellow mustard--fancy the vividness of that color!
Traveling in that wandering fashion, it was noon before we got down to
Beauvais, where we stopped for luncheon supplies and to see what is
perhaps the most remarkable cathedral in the world. It is one of the
most beautiful, and, though it consists only of choir and transepts, it
is one of the largest. Its inner height, from floor to vaulting, is 158
feet. The average ten-story skyscraper could be set inside of it. There
was once a steeple that towered to the giddy height of five hundred
feet, but in 1573, when it had been standing three hundred years, it
fell down from having insufficient support. The inner work is of white
stone,--marble,--and the whole place seems filled with light.
Beauvais has many interesting things, but the day had become very warm,
and we did not linger. We found some of the most satisfactory pastries
I have ever seen in France, fresh, and dripping with richness; also a
few other delicacies, and by and by, under a cool apple-tree on the
road to Compiègne, the Joy and I spread out our feast and ate it and
listened to some little French birds singing, "_Vite! Vite! Vite!_"
meaning that we must be "Quick! Quick! Quick!" so they could have the
crumbs.
It was at Compiègne that Joan of Arc was captured by her enemies, just
a year before that last fearful day at Rouen. She had relieved Orleans,
she had fought Patay, she had crowned the king at Rheims; she would
have had her army safely in Paris if she had not been withheld by a
weak king, influenced by his shuffling, time-serving counselors. She
had delivered Compiègne the year before, but now again it was in
trouble, besieged by the Duke of Burgundy.
"I will go to my good friends of Compiègne," she said, when the news
came; and taking such force as she could muster, in number about six
hundred cavalry, she went to their relief.
From a green hill commanding the valley of the Oise the Joy and I
looked down upon the bright river and pretty city which Joan had seen
on that long ago afternoon of her last battle for France. Somewhere on
that plain the battle had taken place, and Joan's little force for the
first time had failed. There had been a panic; Joan, still fighting and
trying to rally her men, had been surrounded, dragged from her horse,
and made a prisoner. She had led her last charge.
We crossed a bridge and entered the city, and stopped in the big public
square facing Laroux's beautiful statue of Joan which the later
"friends of Compiègne" have raised to her memory. It is Joan in
semi-armor, holding aloft her banner; and on the base in old French is
inscribed, "_Je yray voir mes bons amys de Compiègne_"--"I will go to
see my good friends of Compiègne."
Many things in Compiègne are beautiful, but not many of them are very
old. Joan's statue looks toward the handsome and richly ornamented
hôtel de ville, but Joan could not have seen this building, for it
dates a hundred years after her death. There are the handsome churches,
in one or both of which she doubtless worshiped, when she had first
delivered the city, and possibly a few houses of that ancient time
still survive.
Next morning we visited the palace. It has been much occupied by
royalty, for Compiègne was always a favorite residence of the rulers of
France. Napoleon came there with the Empress Marie Louise, and Louis
Philippe and Napoleon III both found retirement there.