As a rule, and certainly with most fairies, mortals are considered to
be very stupid. In fairyland, the reputation of human beings, as dull
witted and slow, is a fixed tradition.
Before doing a new thing, men and women have to think it out. They talk
a good deal about “cause and effect”; whereas, with fairies, there are
no causes, but things, and events just happen. If they do not, the
fairies make them.
Some situations, like the sun and moon, the earth and sky, the summer
and winter, cannot be changed. Yet fairies can bring to pass lots of
wonders that surprise men. They can play tricks that puzzle them beyond
measure.
A hundred years ago, before the days of tourists, alpenstocks, hotels,
electric railroads, and other foolish novelties, the guides, and all
village folk, believed in the fairies. They felt as sure of giants and
dwarfs, elves, and dragons, as folk of today, that never saw a dodo, or
a pterodactyl, or an auroch, or a five-toed horse, believe these were
once plentiful on the earth.
In fact, there was once a time, when men had no clocks or
wrist-watches, and girls did not carry at their waist the pretty gold
or nickel time-keepers of today. Nor did the big bells in the towers
boom out the hours, nor were the huge clock-faces or dials seen, by day
or by night. In the castles of Switzerland, where rich men or nobles
lived, they knew nothing about marking the hours and minutes by
anything, with a round face, having figures on it. One way to announce
the hours was to have a candle, with two little brass balls, on
opposite sides of the wax, and tied together with a string. When the
flame burned, say, an inch, or other measured space, the balls dropped
down into a brass basin. This made a loud, ringing noise, which sounded
out the hours. Or, a little hammer struck a bell, and that is the
reason why a clock, as its name was at first, was called a klok, or
bell. On ships, the bells sounded every hour, and half hour, and this
is still the method, to which sailors are accustomed; “eight bells”
marking the end of one of the three periods of four hours each, into
which the day is divided.
The fairies could always tell the time, as well as men, by the sun, but
they were more interested in the moon and stars, for night was their
joy time. The common people had no word for a minute, or a second, or
anything less than an hour. They knew when the sun rose and set, and
they guessed the time of day from the place of the sun in the sky—at
the east, as it rose in the morning, and during the afternoon, as it
sank in the west.
After the Alpen glow, or rosy light, that flushed the mountains like a
maiden’s blush, the fairies came out to dance in the meadows. They
always went away and disappeared at sunrise, for the dancing fairies
would be turned into stone, if the sun’s rays struck them. It was even
worse for them, than for mortals, who, even amid the ice and snow, when
climbing high mountains, might be sunstruck and die. One family of the
flowers they named Four o’Clocks.
But by and bye, men learned that they could set two sticks in a line
north and south, and the shadow line from one stick would touch the
other. They called this time twelve o’clock, or noon. The old men also
took notice that, in the long days of summer, the sun lengthened and,
in cold winter, shortened its shadows. They were thus able to count the
days before the flowers would bloom in the springtime. Then the yodel
music would sound and the cows be driven to pasture up in the high
mountains.
From this noon shadow of the sun, men got the idea of the sundial.
Placing a round disc, or plate, made of brass, or copper, on a stone or
post, and setting on one side of it a metal pin, they noticed the sun’s
shadow going round it in a circle. On the spaces, they marked the
hours. Soon, it became the general fashion to have sundials in the
gardens.
Yet all the time the fairies laughed at mortals and declared that if
they could live on the earth, during the sunshiny hours, they would be
able to tell the time of day from the flowers and the sun’s place in
the sky. So, just for the fun of it, whenever they noticed a new
sundial, of brass, or stone, set up in a garden, they invariably held a
ball, and danced around it all night.
Once in a while, they went into a church when no one was there, and
walked and sported around the hour glass in the pulpit.
Of the arrant stupidity of some mortals, the fairies became finally and
perfectly sure, when one night, they gathered together for a merry
dance around a new sundial. This had been placed, only that day, in a
garden owned by an old fellow, who was reputed, by his neighbors, to be
a very wise man. The fairies were interrupted in their plan of playing
ring-around-a-rosy, when their sentinel, set to watch, had seen a
strange sight and called out a loud alarm.
Now this funny old fellow had a name which, if translated, into
English, would be Soft Pudding. He was a kind-hearted chap, that loved
the birds, and his pets, and children, but he was a most absent-minded
codger. He never knew where his hat was, when he went outdoors, so his
wife tied it, by a string, on to his button hole, as she did the little
children’s mittens with a bit of tape, over their shoulders. Yet he was
a delightful daddy, and all the little folks loved him.
Mr. Soft Pudding gladly paid the bill for his new toy, the sundial. He
was so overjoyed at the idea of telling time by a shadow, that he
talked about it for hours. Indeed, he was so absorbed in it, that he
forgot all about the sun, and the necessity of its shining, or that
daylight was at all requisite for his enjoyment, in looking at the
sundial.
So, on one cool autumn night, old Soft Pudding put on his cloak,
lighted his lantern, and walked out into the garden to see what time it
might be! Fool that he was, he found that as he changed the position of
the lantern, its rays every time cast a new shadow. Instead of its
showing one time, it looked as if there were several times, marked by
the pin; and, as if everything had gone wrong. Then, for the first
time, the idea entered his head that sundials were for use, during the
daytime only.
“Who would have thought it?” he cried, as he tramped back into his
house, hoping his wife would not know the object of his errand and
laugh at him. But he did not tell her, and she thought he had gone out
to look after the cows.
But the fairies were irritated and in bad temper, because they had been
driven away, by this intruder on their pleasures. They laughed at his
stupidity, but their vexation was plain to be seen.
“He might as well have had a wooden head, or one made of a squash. This
only shows what fools these mortals be,” said one fairy to another.
“Oh, don’t be angry, or sneer at him,” said an old fairy, who was a
famous inventor. “Stupid though he is, he and his wife have always been
kind to us fairies. Leave him to me. I’ll put another idea in his head.
For the sake of his people, I’ll teach him to turn the dial upside
down, turn its face outward, and put hands and fingers on its face,
with wheels inside and weights below. Then, he can always have what he
expected, this evening, to do; and tell the time, at night, as well as
by day.
“And I’ll make the new contrivance sing. No longer shall a timekeeper
be called a bell, to strike or sound the hours. I’ll put a bird inside,
to fly out and call out the hours.”
So the next night, the Queen of the Fairies took counsel of the owl,
the wisest of all the birds, and also as fair-minded as a judge, who is
just to all and the favorite of none. The owl decided that the cuckoo
would serve best, and could be most depended upon always to come out,
flap its wings, and chirp out the proper numbers of the hours.
The Fairy Queen was surprised. “How can you, sir Judge, nominate a bird
of bad character? The cuckoo is a pirate. Does it not lay its eggs in
the nests of other birds? How often, besides stealing their homes, it
throws out the eggs of the rightful owners, and, because of this
robbery, the birdies die.”
“True, I have considered this,” said the owl, “but the cuckoo is a
summer bird, that eats up the hairy caterpillars, which other birds
will not touch. In this manner, it helps the trees to grow and the
fruit to ripen, so that men have a clean country for the fairies to
play in. Besides, in the courting season, you know it is the male
bird’s love note, that sounds so sweetly, in April, May and June, and
this song, ‘cuckoo, cuckoo,’ we all love to hear.”
The Queen of the Fairies pondered this answer. She was impressed with
the owl’s wisdom, and, besides, she wanted all the fairies to love each
other. So she concluded to invite the male cuckoo bird to be her model,
for the new clock, that was to make Switzerland wealthy and famous.
Surely, such clocks would be wanted, all over the world.
The land being rich in walnut trees, there was no trouble in getting
plenty of wood, dark and handsome, to be carved. So, appearing to old
Soft Pudding, in a dream, the fairy queen said to him.
“Although we fairies all had a good laugh at you, when we saw you
coming out of your house at night, with a lantern, to tell the time at
the sundial, thus breaking up our party, yet because you have always
been so kind to the birds, and loved our fairy folks, and the children,
I will show you how to make a new kind of clock. It will not only mark
the hours on its face, without the aid of the sun, but will send out a
cuckoo, every hour, to flap its wings in delight. Then this wooden bird
will call out ‘cuckoo, cuckoo,’ as if a real one in feathers were
making love to its mate. Do you not, yourself, think that the affection
of the lover bird, thus shown, will increase mutual affection in your
own house and brighten every Swiss home, and many more homes, beyond
the sea?”
“I am sure it will. Thank you heartily,” said Soft Pudding.
Then the Fairy Queen held out before his gaze a lovely cuckoo clock,
made of black walnut, with hands and face-figures cut out of the wood
of the white birch tree.
When he woke up in the morning, out of his sleep, old Soft Pudding
stretched out his hands to receive the gift, but it was daylight, and,
of course, the fairy was gone. It was the common light of the sun, but
he was very happy, even though he had only dreamed. He proceeded at
once to turn his dream into reality, by constructing the clock.
Within a week, he had made the works. Then, he set them inside a black
walnut case, with ivory figures on the dial. After several attempts, he
succeeded with the wooden cuckoo, that would come out, flap its wings,
and chirp the number of the hours, and go inside the shut doors, while
the clock face also marked the proper point.
Then, he brought his whole family, one morning, near the moment when
the minute hand was approaching the proper dot on the disc.
What was their surprise, when, without any one touching the little
black house, which was set on the wall, the doors flew open, and out
strutted a cuckoo, flapping its wings. It chirped out, ten times, and
then bowed, went into its box again, and the little doors shut.
The children all clapped their hands and the mother embraced her
husband in joy. By and bye, for ivory, which was very costly, Mr. Soft
Pudding used white birch for the clock hands.
Then he set up a factory, and this gave work to many villagers, men and
women, boys and girls. He soon made a fortune, and now, no one called
him Soft Pudding, but every one saluted him with a title of respect.
When he died, he left his wealth to his family. To this day, his
cuckoos flap their wings, and salute the hours, in every land. Because
the wooden clock and bird were black, the time-telling cuckoo, which
was sometimes hitched to a barometer, or set in a toy, to foretell the
weather, was called the “rain-crow.” But, with this beginning, made by
the cuckoo clock, Switzerland became a land of clocks, watches, and
musical boxes.
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