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The Great industries of the United States (1873)
The Great industries of the United States - 1873 Author:Horace Greeley Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: WATCHES, AND MACHINE WATCH-MAKING. THE WATCH : ORIGlW OF THB WORD. — THE BELL. — THE CLOCK : EARLY HISTORY.— Thb Clepsydra: Its Etymology: The Chinese Us... more »b It: DescripTion. THE HOUR GLASS: PERSIAN CALIPH'S GIFT TO CHARLEMAGNE.— GALILEO AND THE PENDULUM.—TOWN CLOCKS. — MANUFACTURE IN TUB UNITED STATES. — CONSTRUCTION OF THE WATCH, ETC. The word watch comes from the Saxon wceccan, signifying to wake, to excite, and is the name applied to the numerous species of time-markers which have sprung legitimately from that old slirps, or "stock," the "clock" — the earliest history of which is lost in the night of the past, but which has played so wondrous a part in the civilization of the world ; and who knows but in barbarism too ? for the meaning of the term originally was " bell," and is still retained in the French cloche. And since it is probable that the first sound man produced by artificial means was the resonance of bodies struck together by the hands somewhat as the tongue of a bell strikes its sides, it is quite likely that the "bell," and consequently the "clock" in embryo, were among the very first conceits and mechanical accomplishments of primitive man. Yet in the very early ages there could have been but little need of any measurers of time save those which nature affords ; as the day and night, the rising and the setting of the sun and the moon, and the numerous phases of the latter. Then, as human observation became more extended and accurate, the varying constellations marked the wider passages of time. So our aborigines still count time by the moon's passages—-"Ten moons have gone;" and, indeed, in the field to-day for the laborer, and wherever in the backwoods men find it inconvenient, or are for other reasons unable, to afford the luxury of a supply o...« less