SUN-DIALS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20384, 12 October 1929, Page 1 (Supplement)

SUN-DIALS.

MARKING THE. TIME.

BY KOTAHE.

Tho sun-dial is a pleasant reminder of tho days when time ran more slowly, and man was not doomed to a frantic scramble from the cradlo to tho grave. It. has mado an appoarance in many an Auckland garden; sometimes strangely girt with vivid exotics where in the old days it gazed placidly at the sun amid tho lilacs and pinks and sweet williani and honesty and lavender. It brings the tender grace of a day that is dead; a vision of stately homes and noble trees and richlv-clad figures of an older, more serene world.

Man lias always needed to know tho time. In Homo tho water-clock server! the household needs. A man could not carry it in his pocket or whatcvei corresponded to a pocket in tho flowing toga It was a simple devtco that any schoolboy to-day could manufacture in a spare hour. A vessel was filled with water. A small hole, was punctured in it. The water level was carefully noted. In an hour it was found that tho watei had, sunk to a certain point, which was marked on the side of the container. And so with larger and smaller spaces of time. It could not mark the smaller intervals. One could hardly boil eggs or timo tho sprinter by it, for it knew nothing of split seconds or minutes for that matter. It. might servo for a marathon race, but its time-marking was 011 broad and generous lines which suited an age not bothered with the mania for records. Tho Sun. Men must have reckoned time by the sun from tho earliest years. Tho moving shadow as a handy method of marking tho march of ,t;mo would suggest itsclt even to (ho savage mind. When men worshipped tho sun god the movement of (he sun-cast shadow was carefully calculated by the priests of the cult, whether tho temple was raised to Apollo or Ha 01 Mithra. Tho temples were designed to catch the midsummer sunrays at a given angle. Astronomers arc ablo to calculate tho exact age of Stonehenge, for example, by noting how far the line of tho structure now varies from its obvious original position in relation to tho sun. Tho sun-dial had originally a religious significance. In its conventional form it st,ill bears some suggestion of an ancient altar. Liko the Yule log or tho maypole nr the mistletoe it marks a survival in the folk mind of the older religion of tho English soil, a tribal memory of massive temple and oak forest shrine and tree worship and sun altar of the ancient Druid days.

But here the old pods guard their round. And ill her siecrct hen ft The heathen kingdom Yv ilfnd found Dreams us sho dwells apart. But the dial survived solely as a marker of time. It was usually massivo and consequently stationary. Yet it early assumed a portable form. I have «i modern Chineso pocket dial, not much bigger than the bulky Waterbury \witcn of our youth. It has inset a small compass to give the exact bearing, and when that has been determined a match-like pioce of wood can act as a style or gnomon to cast its shadow over the carefully graduated dial-plate. Probably the Chinese could carry with him a compact instrument to tell the time a minute when our ancestors were roaming over the landscape with skins to keep out the cold, and a neat coat of woad to satisfy the decorative instinct. Portable Dials. Shakespeare's contemporaries evidently carried a portable dial. It required a poke for its accommodation, and could hardly be called a pocket time-piece. The melancholy Jaques developed an unaccustomed exuberance of enthusiasm when lie found in the woods a fellow philosopher whose sole companion was a miniature dial. A fool, a fool! I met n fool i' ; tlio forest. A motley fool—a miserable world! As Ido live by food I ™et amo ~ . Who laid him down and basked him in the And "railed on Lady Fortuno in good terms, in good set terras. . , And then ho drew a dial from his l.oko And looking on it. until lack-histre eje Said very wisely, It is ten o clock, Thus may we *jee, quoth he, the •svorid wage."

Tho possession of a time-piece, though it wero only a dial in a hag, seems to satisfv some obscure human instinct. What bov ever fully recaptures the first imo careless rapture, of his first days ownership of a watch? Ho glows with conscious prids. If everyone he meets docs not want to know tho time he gives the information unasked. For one day at least the passage of time becomes the nucme matter in the universe. _ I remember a boy on a farm in the souUi who alleged that lie had bean presented with a watch of great value, but who always went apart from his fellow workers to consult the oracle. He alleged the watch was ton valuable to be worn at his work and that it had to be kept wrapped up in chamois out of tho sun. A sceptical friend raided the Maori kit in which the treasure lay and found a very large and battered alarmclock. Poor laddie! He was the only one that did not own a watch of some sort, and ho could not bear to be out of fashion. Mottoes. Mr. Pepys, though secretary of the Admiraltv, and one of the big men in the Civil* Service, was as excited as any hoy when someone presented him with a watch. " Lord, to seo how much of my old folly and childishness hangs upon me still that I cannot forbear carrying my watch in my hand in tho coach all this afternoon, and seeing what o'clock it is one hundred times, and am apt to think with myself how I could be so long without one." Tho sun-dial of the garden was usually inscribed. There is a literature of dial mottoes. I have just read a lengthy collection. Most of the motto makers have felt the need to bo didactic. Tho instrument .that marked the time proclaimed that time was passing and one end was certain. Memento mori was tho burden of their moralising. Usually there was ;i stern note of warning. You could not read tho hour without learning that time passes, that hero wo may not stay, that lifo is but a shadow, that soon cometli the night. Time's {.'loss and scythe Thy life and death declaro; Spend well thy time And for thy death prepare. That was the burden of most of them. Sometimes the warning took another form. A dial in the Isle of Man advises us to " praise tho good day in tlio evening," another version of the familiar injunction as to the suitable timo to count your chickens. " I count only the bright hours " I have seen often. " I'ereunt et imputantur "is also a classic. It has been perfectly rendered in tho Scottish idiom, " Bye, but not Byewith." " Thou knowest my hour, not thine," is an admirablo version of the familiar warning. Not so often is the motto-maker of an epicurean cast of inind. Still, many dials proclaim the advice of Hari'ick to " gather tho rosebuds while vo may," and its move usual variant, " Carpe diem." Tho two I like best are the French " C'est l'houro de bion faire;" and the Latin " Non quantum sed quo modo." " It is tho hour to do a good deed," and " Not quantity but quality matters."