CLOCKS.
The first Clock we know of in this Country was put up in an old tower of Westminster Hall, in the year 1288, and in 1292, there was one in the Cathedral of Canterbury. These were probably of foreign workmanship; and it may be doubted, if there was at that time any person who followed the business of making clocks. There was, however, one very ingenious artist, Richard of Wallingford, Abbot of St. Albans, who constructed a clock which represented the motions of the sun, moon, and stars, and the ebbing and flowing of the sea. That this wonderful piece of mechanism might be of permanent utility to his Abbey, he composed a book of directions for the management of it. And Leland who appears to have seen it, says, that in his opinion all Europe could not produce such another.
There is a fine specimen of ancient Clock-making in Wells Cathedral. It is a clock constructed by Peter Lightfoot, one of the monks of Glastonbury, about the year 1325, of complicated design and ingenious execution. It was originally put up in that celebrated Monastery, and was placed in the south transept, and by means of a communication tolled the hours on the great bell of the central tower, whilst the quarters were struck by automata on two small bells in the transept. The dial plate shews the hours, and also the changes of the moon, the solar and other astronomical motions; on its summit there is an horizontal frame work, which exhibits by the aid of machinery, eight knights on horseback armed for a tournament, and pursuing each other with a rapid rotatory motion. At the Reformation this clock was removed from Glastonbury Abbey to its present situation in Wells Cathedral.
The Clock in Exeter Cathedral was erected by Bishop Courtenay in the year 1480. It is on the Ptolemaic system of Astronomy and of a curious construction for the age in which it was put up. The earth is represented by a globe in the centre; the sun by a fleur-de-lys; and the moon by a ball painted half black and half white, which turns on its axis, and shews the different phases of that luminary.
ALDUS MANUTIUS.
[DIED 1516.]
It would be difficult to say whether the exertions of any individual, however splendid his talents, or even the labours of any particular association, or academy, however celebrated, ever shed so much lustre on the place of their residence as that which Venice derives from the reputation of a stranger, who voluntarily selected it for his abode. I allude to Aldus Manutius. This extraordinary person combined the lights of the scholar, with the industry of the mechanic; and to his labours, carried on without interruption till the conclusion of a long life, the world owes the first or principes editiones of twenty eight Greek Classics. Among these we find Pindar, Æschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Herodotus, Thucydides, Demosthenes, Plato, and Aristotle. Besides these, there are few ancient authors of any note, of whom this indefatigable editor has not published editions of acknowledged accuracy, and as far as the means of the art of printing, then in its infancy, permitted, of great beauty. In order to appreciate the merit of Aldus, we must consider the difficulties under which he must have laboured at a time when there were few public libraries; when there was no regular communication between distant cities; when the price of manuscripts put them out of the reach of persons of ordinary incomes; and when the existence of many since discovered, was utterly unknown. The man who could surmount these obstacles, and publish so many authors till then inedited; who could find means and time to give new and more accurate editions of so many others already published, and accompany them all with prefaces mostly of his own composition; who could extend his attention still farther and by his labours secure the fame, by immortalizing the compositions of the most distinguished scholars of his own age and country, must have been endowed in a very high degree, not only with industry and perseverance, but with judgment, learning, and discrimination. One virtue more, Aldus possessed in common with many of the great literary characters of that period, I mean, a sincere and manly piety, a virtue which gives consistency, vigour, and permanency to every good quality, and never fails to communicate a certain grace and dignity to the whole character.