THE GOLDEN HOUR

Marlborough Express, Volume L, Issue 155, 3 July 1916, Page 3

THE GOLDEN HOUR

DAYLIGHT SAVING IN BRITAIN

CITY PEOPLE DELIGHTED

The London Daily Mail of May 2 says: — Never was thove a piece of legislation that eamo so easily into operation and gave such immediate and

complete satisfaction as th© Summer Time Act. It came into effect at two o'clock yesterday morning, when the hand& >of thd clock were put forward an hour so that after two o'clock had struck the dial registeied one minute aiter three. But by the evening, when the lighb lingered for an hour longer than darkness was due by tho calendar, the sixty minutes that had seemed to have been lost were seen to have been regained, and regained plus the incalculable addition to the sum of- human happiness and enjoyment. Everybody was delighted. Tho1 fcencficeni; effects of the Bank Holiday Act were not in the beginning' so immediately recognised and universally welcomedl ' The memory of the late Mr William Willett, apostle of the Daylight Saving schorne, was promptly elevated to I the pedestal of a popular phrase-^—a. companionable pedestal to thab which commemorates Sir John Lubbock'si benefaction. People were referring ' .jesfcerday to "Willett time" 311 st as' iJiey talk about the Festival of St. Lubbock, and neither reformer could 1 have desired a better memorial than the perpetuation of his name in a, popular phraso. I GLORIOUS FIRST DAY. 1 The new daylight saying plan had tho luck of coming into operation I under the mo~t perfect oonJitions imaginable. Yesterday was oho of 1 the most glorious early summer | Sundays that ever wore known. It 1 I was an ideal day of sunshine with an , ideal breeze—a day of which evory 1 ' moment of the morning, the after-, noon, and the evening was golden, and to be made tho most of. ~

No matter what the aceastomed hour of being abroad, on© hour earlier on such a day as yesterday made a difference that amounted to a revelation of delight. The birds were still singing the£r morning chorus, -fob morning air was cool, and tho morning light was clpar when people" walked to church. Their first impression of tho new tune scheme was that instead of having lost un hour th.it morning they had l<eon Hosing an hour of every sumjier day in all' their lifetime. The new scheme brauoht one o'clock luncheon to the hour of high noon, which, ps tho treasured menory of Continental holidays recalls is* the mosL agreeable hour for a .summer meal. And after luncheon for the average Londoner there was the gift of an extra hour of daylight That made a little mn out into the green country bj7 motor-car, tramway car, or omnibus all the' more i>ra.cticable; and all the more enjoyable.

CROWDED PARKS. All London Avent to Hyde Park iast night to enjoy its <irst stolen hour. At nine, true to printed and painted notices, The band ,of thefist Life Guards, having faithfully played since seven, folded its music and silently stole away, leaving an astopished crowd wondering whether it had be^n tricked'out of its evening music or not.

Though the band might go the crowd remained. Its numbers were uncountable. ' It filled' every chair and most .spots on the grass. It flowed down thp roadways insteid of keeping to the broad' paths*. if tho band .had only pJay«jd that extra hour, its joy would have been completa It was a typical London war crowd. Venus was there from Whitehall and the City, Mars from the barracks and billets, and hundreds of those mysterious young, uwbadged, "indispensables," who, despite every i*ct .iiid all ihe tribunals^ &eem to succaad in keeping out of khaki. The weary and the wounded had gone ho.no to bed by summei-time and take their hour of daylight in the morning. Those who wer<^< young and strong took the hour trom the night and wandered down tho roads of the park, reluctantly going home at aai hour which they fejt to be "too early.", ' ' . "A vonderful sight." said a chair attendant. "What a season we shall have if this continues. • Have you ever seen the park so full?" Will it b© found that our extra hour of morning light means an extra hour of'evening work or play? 'Certainly the cowd m the park last night Suggested that you may get' a man vp 1 £n the morning for his breakfast, but it is another matter sending him to bed at uight. In the City and the West End, where the week's business comes to an end when the Saturday halfholiday begins, many people took old Father Willett by the forelock and put thei>- clock forward when they shut up their offices and *hops. This led to soire confusion and misunderstanding on Saturday afternocta said evening on tho part of people who took some of the- prematurely accelerated street docks at their face value.

By way of ensuringl that there should be no mistake upon the morrow, .several members of iho same family had each on Saturday night advanced the hands of the domestic clocks! At one house in Bayswater the clocks are said" to have registered eight o'clock, when by Greenwich moan time It was only five. The mispress of the household had advanced them the necesciry hour after dinner on Saturday night; the head of the family, iorgetting this had already been done, put them forward another hour before going to bedj and the subaltern son hovne on ieaive, who had been spending tho evening in town, put them another hour forward when he reached the house-

FARMERS' OBJECTIONS. The Summer Time Act; is ,to be ignored by the generality of fanners, at aiiy iato in East Anglia. As one leading agriculturist \ said • VVe _ see no goprl in itfronj our pomt of view, arid shall talre no notice of it, we shall <ro on as before.' 3

Apart ; from the qtiesti on whethei the laborers could be got to work *.n hour ■earlier (and on some farms they have rcundlv declared they will not do it), ther/ is the natural restriction on work imposed : by ; the sun. ■■_ Said a farmer, who also grows soft frait:: f'Wo;*lc atnonq: growing crops cannot he done while the, dew; lies. You caiitib.t t4ke your machine into. dew r soake&!"iields. i ;Vs lor strawberry piqking,fif that were begun whil9tl>e fruit was wet I should sooni be at a loss on;;4;he. crop.! .: ; \ ;■ i " ."If I hp-ve my hands out an Jiour earlier in. the day andfind them odd jobs here and there which is not always easy, during that; first hoiir I lose an hour's iabor:at >he rit.il task of the'season unless I poyovertiin-?;