"For example, when war in France drove many of the French artisans to England, up rose the London clockmakers to protest against any of the French makers practicing their craft within their domains. Fortunately the petition was denied and at length these skilled workmen were enrolled in the company and together with their descendants gave to England some of her most beautiful clocks. But the old guild members did not suffer it without a wrench, I can tell you."
McPhearson took up a small screwdriver and proceeded to fasten the back on to the clock he held in his hand.
"It wasn't all smooth sailing, being a clockmaker in those days," he declared. "What wonder the horologers were jealous of their art? Just remember there were no factories to produce for you the screws, rivets, wheels, and parts you needed. You yourself had to make everything with the scant supply of tools at your command, usually a file, drill, and hammer. With these you hammered out your brass wheels to the required thickness, notched the teeth in their edges with the file, and fitted them into place. And when you consider that with this crude equipment you were expected to turn out a mechanism delicate enough to tell time, I am sure you will agree the stern old clockmakers had something on their side."
"They sure had!" Christopher exclaimed with enthusiasm.
"It is a glory to this Richard Parsons' skill that two hundred years after he made his clock it is still accurately performing its task. If anything I made was in existence at the end of a like stretch of time and was continuing to be useful, I should feel I had a right to be proud, shouldn't you?"
"You bet I would. Nothing I make ever stays together more than a week."
The Scotchman laughed at the boyish confession.
"Now you can understand, I guess, why I sent Bailey away, telling him I should have to dream over this bracket clock. Two hundred years is a long time and methods have changed greatly since then. Therefore in order to repair such a product, I shall have to think myself back into the year 1700 and work in the fashion Richard Parsons did; otherwise I cannot successfully take up his handiwork. A clockmaker has to have imagination, you see."
"I never thought of that."
"It is such puzzles as these that make my trade interesting," McPhearson observed. "If every clock that came to me was of precisely the same pattern as every other, the work I do would be monotonous enough. But it is because clocks are as different as people that they pique my curiosity. Even those turned out in factories, for example, are never twice alike."