THE SILVER BALL

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22004, 30 January 1937, Page 15

THE SILVER BALL

(specially written toe the press.) [By W.E.M.]

[A series of chances has delayed the publication of this article, and in the meantime the sundial has been displaced by a statuette.]

In the centre of the mirror pool in the new rose garden there used to stand a silver ball. It was very beautiful. As soon as you came in sight of it, it flashed the sun back at you, and you smiled to see it. When you came nearer, you saw everything reflected in it, pleasantly distorted. It was very, very beautiful. And now a ruthless hand has plucked its beauty and planted a sundial in its place. We know that the old must perish; youth will be served—“Cedit enim rerum novitate extrusa vetustas.” We read in the dictionary that a sundial is a device for measuring time, but we know very well that in practice it is a garden ornament; as a clock it is as obsolete as the clepsydra. We accept the Bowker fountain cheerfully; we do not want our springs tp be for ever, decorated with waternymphs, done tastefully in concrete, which no one has ever thought of worshipping. But the sundial—we hope to keep it for a few more years. •

After all, you can tell the time by them, if you want to. The nymph may have been immortal, but the sun has lasted longer. If-you felt that the modern world is nothing but bustle and nuisance, you could always go to a sundial and put your watch right, more or less. And :f any one murmured that sundials were obsolete, you could answer firmly, “Obsolescent.” But now we have a sundial surrounded by a foot or two of water; you must be • an all-the-year swimmer to make use of it. And if you did stand up for your principles, and wade in stout-heartedly, ten to one some shirt-sleeved minion would tell you, “Here, that pool’s not meant for bathing.” An ornament, nothing more. By the Archery Lawn stands another sundial; you can get to this one. On it, as tradition orders, there is a legend. If the sculptor had meant it to be used, he would have chosen something suitable to the age, something snappy in the American fashion: “Time is money,” or “Hurry, or you’ll be left.”

Instead, what has he done? He has taken a Latin hendecasyllable, “Horas non numero nisi serenas.” A hendecasyllable, I repeat; one of the pleasantest metres for lighthearted Verse that the wit of man has ever devised; Tennyson played with them, but they are hard in English. And what did he do with it? He chopped it up and re-ordered it into mere jumpy prose. A sundial is an old-world thing, said he, and so is Latin; no sane man wastes time c.i either, but they go well together; and if he turned his verse into barbarous cacophony, what did he care? It is disheartening. In the old days sundials were built on stable walls, where time might be of some importance; now, we plant them in flower beds, where it is of none, or in the middle of ponds. In the old days they were workaday, useful, and kept in the yard; now they are ornamental, useless, and set out for all to admire. Is it true, then, that nothing can be beautiful while it is of use?

Perhaps it is. Nobody knows what beauty is, and that makes the question a hard one. I would not have you think that I claim to know the answer, but I would suggest, tentatively, a new definition: “A sense of beauty is man’s reaction to a life that demands progress.” It seems to work out well enough in practice. At modern furniture, modern verse, modern sculpture, we smile politely or derisively. If we see a Norman castle or a ruined abbey, we gape, and say “How beautiful!” If we see a Roman bath, we gape and gape. If we go to Egypt and see the bulky pyramids, we gape, and gape, and gape. Our past may be stepping stones, but how cheerfully we linger to admire the view.

Biologically also it seems reasonable. The animals have ne grim god of progress to urge them on. When two sheep charge each other, neither wonders what new poison gas its enemy has invented. In a peaceful, stick-in-the-mud universe, only man sets out to break records. Some playful god has given us a jolt, heaved us out of our rut; is it not natural that we should hanker after it?

In the course of time, no doubt, we shall find a new one, and sink into it gratefully. In the world’s slow purpose, it is impossible that the tireless ferment of man’s activity should be eternal. The time will come when past and future are identical, and the present no more than a slice of them; we shall live incuriously, like the other beasts. Meanwhile, no doubt, we should all be captains of our souls, march face forwards. So we will, cheerfully—most of the time. But please, Mr McPherson, leave us our past for just a little longer. Do not put your sundials in the middles of ponds, where we cannot check our watches by them. When you quote Latin, respect the laws of metre. And, please, give us back our silver ball—it was so beautiful.