Christopher and the Clockmakers

by Sara Ware Bassett

"Of course in our day the price of jewels has gone up a great deal. There was a time when a full-jeweled watch did not begin to cost what it does now. However, we are free of certain other expenses the old watchmakers encountered," went on Mr. Burton. "For example, about the year 1800, when England was anxious to raise money for the treasury, William Pitt proposed that a tax be placed on the wearing of watches."

"That's worse than having to pay a tax on theater tickets—a good sight!" jested Christopher.

"It certainly meant the taxation of a very useful commodity; we should term it an indispensable one. At that period of history, though, watches and clocks were far less cheap and common and therefore Mr. Pitt may have classed them as luxuries and rated them as our government does perfumery. However that may be, his suggestion of levying two shillings sixpence on every silver watch and ten shillings on every gold one, with the additional tax of five shillings on every clock, went through."

"I don't see why the English people stood for it," said the boy, his hereditary resentment against unjust taxation aroused.

"They were pretty thoroughly vexed, I assure you," was the reply. "It meant, you see, very disastrous results for the horologists. In fact, even outside the trade feeling ran high. Not only were numberless excellent workmen thrown out of their jobs and the watchmaking industry given a general setback, but the public, just coming to appreciate the value of a good timepiece, was vastly inconvenienced. Many persons revolted and ceased to carry watches rather than pay the tax. Some did this as a protest; others because they could not afford the additional expenditure. In the meantime an article known as the Act of Parliament clock was made and put up in the taverns, inns, and coffee houses to aid customers and serve as an additional declaration against the Pitt tax. So general was public disapproval and so bitter the storm created that a year after the law had passed it had to be repealed."

"That's the stuff! It ought to have been," cried young America fervently.

"Yes, I agree with you. It certainly was a mistaken method for raising an income for the State. Once abolished, the industry slowly began to pick up again. Nevertheless, for all that, England never thrived at watchmaking as did France, Switzerland and our own nation. One reason was because she clung stubbornly to the old-fashioned fusee long after other people had abandoned it for the spring. There she made a great mistake. Still, after this Pitt tax was abolished, the craft began, as I said, to get on its feet again. Little by little machinery replaced hand labor and as more watches were turned out the price of them dropped. Also, as foreign trade increased, it became possible to import from other countries parts or the entire works of both clocks and watches. Perhaps had not this arrangement been so easy and simple, England would have been obliged to buck up and evolve a big watch industry of her own; as it was she followed the less difficult path and never went into the manufacture on a large scale with factories and all that."

"How about the French?" Christopher inquired.

"The French, no one can deny, were very ingenious watchmakers. To begin with, they had artistic ideas and great cleverness in producing beautiful and unique designs. The wrist watch, held by thousands of people to be such a boon, was of French invention. But it was the Swiss who were the master watchmakers of the Old World. A French horologer moved to Switzerland, carrying his trade with him, and as a result there soon grew up in Geneva a guild of workmen not to be outranked. There had been watchmakers there before, but the standards this guild created established a quality of work hitherto unknown. Men learned their trade and excelled in it until every part of a Swiss watch, one might almost say, was turned out by an expert. Some artisans made nothing but small wheels, some large ones; some fashioned pivots, some drilled jewels in which to set them. Afterward the watch was assembled, as we call it—all its parts being gathered together, put in place, and adjusted. A Geneva watch thus constructed bore what was practically the trademark of excellence. There was nothing finer on the market."

"Were all Swiss watches equally good?" inquired Christopher.