‘THE KING CAN DO NO WRONG!’
Thursley itself is situated on an old road that branches from the newer highway upon entering Witley Common, and rejoins the ordinary route near the “Royal Huts” Hotel. The village is rarely visited by strangers. The old church stands in a commanding position, overlooking a wide tract of country, including the Hog’s Back, by Guildford, and the scattered ponds of Frensham. An old sun-dial on the tower has the inscription Hora pars vitæ, and, like most of our clocks and watches, perpetuates in the numeral “IIII” the long-exploded fiction of the infallibility of kings. I wonder if any one remembers the origin of the substitution of “IIII” for “IV” on nearly all the dials, whether sun-dials or clock-faces, of civilization? Here is the story. The first clock that kept anything like accurate time was constructed by a certain Henry Vick, in 1370. It was made to the order of Charles V. of France, who was known as “the Wise.” Wise he certainly was, in some respects; but Roman numerals were not within the sum of his knowledge. When Vick brought the King his clock, he looked at its movements awhile. “Yes,” said he, at length, “it works very well; but you have got the figures on the dial wrong.” “Surely never, your Majesty,” said Vick. “Yes,” replied the King, “that IV should be IIII.” “But your Majesty is wrong,” rejoined that not very tactful clockmaker. “Wrong!” answered outraged majesty, “I am never wrong! Take it away and correct the error.” Vick did as he was commanded, and so to this day we have IIII where we should really have IV.
THURSLEY CHURCH.
SUN-DIAL, THURSLEY.
There is a certain interest bound up with the name of Thursley, for it affords an excellent example of the lengths to which antiquaries will go, to scent derivatives. Kemble, the learned author of a deep and scholarly book, “The Saxons in England,” derives the name of Thursley from the Scandinavian god Thor, whose equivalent in Saxon mythology was Thunor. The name of Thunder Hill, a height near the village, has the same origin; but the clinching argument of the neighbouring “Hammer Ponds,” which Mr. Kemble assumes to have been named after Thor’s hammer, spoils the reasoning of the theory altogether, for the “Hammer Ponds” are nothing but the remains of the old forges that were thickly spread over the surface of Kent, Surrey, and Sussex during a period from three centuries to one hundred years ago.
TYNDALL
Just where the road from Thursley rejoins the highway stands the “Huts” Inn, now enlarged and refurbished, and nothing less, if you please, in these days than the “Royal Huts” Hotel. “Ma conscience!” I wonder what friend Cobbett would have thought, and said. But, believe me, nothing less than this would serve the turn of Hindhead district now-a-days, for it fast becoming as suburban as (say) Clapham. Do you want a building-plot, carved out of a waste, where nothing has yet bloomed but the tiny purple bells of the heather or the golden glory of the gorse? Here, then, is your chance, for building-plots fringe the road where, indeed, the trim-built villa has not already risen. Professor Tyndall, who built a house for himself just here, in 1882, selected the situation both for its health-giving air and for its seclusion, but his example served only to advertise the attractions of the place, and the astonishing favour with which Hindhead is now regarded as a residence is directly attributable to him. No one was less pleased than himself at this sudden popularity of a district that had but a few years previously been a more or less “howling” wilderness, for “he was always curiously sensitive to the beauty of scenery,” disliked suburbs, and was also singularly sensitive to being overlooked from any neighbouring house. This preference for reclusion led to the building of the hideous screens which hid from his gaze an ugly house close at hand, and created so much angry controversy a few years ago: screens that to-day remain an unfailing reminiscence of the Professor. Sic monumentum requiris, circumspice, to quote the old tag.