Witness.--"No; it did not strike. It was the cuckoo that went."
Counsel.--"But does your cuckoo always sing right, my good woman?"
Witness.--"Not always, Sir. It is a bit too fast at times."
Counsel.--"It is not worse than other cuckoos, I dare say. There are some of them fast, some of them slow, like men's minds--
''Tis with our judgments as our watches, none
Go just alike, yet each believes his own.'
Can you give me any notion how much your cuckoo clock was usually before the church clock? It differed, of course; but on the average--at its ordinary rate of going?"
Witness.--"Why it got on two or three minutes a-day; but I do not recollect when I last put it back with my thumb."
Counsel.--
"'Ay, 'tis beyond the date of memory:
Event upon event so oft hath trod,
With quick recurring foot, 'tis hard to trace
The worn-out print of Time's incessant step.'
But cannot you give me some idea of what day you usually put the cuckoo clock back with your thumb? These things acquire a regularity by habit which is rarely deviated from, especially in regard to clocks. Every man, woman, and child in the kingdom who has a clock, watch, or other indicator of Time's progress, has some particular day, or perhaps hour for winding up and putting it right. Can you tell me what day you wound up your cuckoo clock, and whether you put it by the church or not on that day?"