HUNS' WAR-AIM WAS FRENCH CLOCKS

Evening Star, Issue 16995, 18 March 1919, Page 6

HUNS' WAR-AIM WAS FRENCH CLOCKS

It. used to bo s,-lid that the Huns were obliged to go to war with Franco every now and then so that they could steal 'a clock that would keep time—this being a thing no timepiece of Hun manufacture ever can do. Some remember that in the Franco-Prussian War the looters grabbed every clock they could get hold of. The leopard has not changed his spots. During the fighting along the Marne the Americans saw the old vagabond clock thieves at work in Chatean-Thierry, stealing every clock in sight. What a commentary upon the much-vaunted ITun efficiency! * They can imitate a clock, but to save their souls they cannot make one that will keep time. Upon this point ‘ MunseyV remarks with sardonic humor: Is it not, perhaps, a favorable omen that the Germans, with all their muchvaunted efficiency, have never been able to construct a clock equal to the product of their neighbors? We know of an American gentleman whoa© constant support, ns well its exasperation, during the present war has been a particularly illogical and unreliable German-made clock. In the darkest hours of the allied cause, when the achievements of the enemy seemed to indicate an almost superhuman effectiveness of organisation, ho has found comfort and hope in tho symbolic vulnerability of this atrocious clock—a clock equipped with an elaborate system of strikes and chimes which excel only in their ability to go astray. Tho French have always rivalled the Swiss and the Dutch as the makers of fine clocks. We are not to be despised ourselves in that respect, as any good Yankee timepiece can demonstrate. A few weeks ago a humorous weekly published the picture of a Tommy in a first-line trench, whose recently-opened parcel from home divulged a new alarm clock. The recipient remarked: “ Well, now, that there certainly is a thoughtful gift.” We should not have said that there was a crying need for this horologieal specimen at the front. We do believe, however, that the allied soldiers can press forward noth the conviction that no race which is unable to manufacture a reputable clock is destined to rule the world.