to the half and quarter strokes, they were wholly useless unless you chanced to know what was the last hour struck. And then, too, I should like to ask you why, in the name of common sense, it should take twelve times as long to tell you it is twelve o'clock as it does to tell you it is one."

The manager laughed as heartily as Hamage had done on learning of my scare of the night before.

"It was lucky for you," he said, "that the clock in your room happened to be a simple time announcer, otherwise you might easily have been startled half out of your wits." I became myself quite of the same opinion by the time he had shown us something of his assortment of clocks. The mere announcing of the hours and quarters of hours was the simplest of the functions of these wonderful and yet simple instruments. There were few of them which were not arranged to "improve the time," as the old-fashioned prayer-meeting phrase was. People's ideas differing widely as to what constitutes improvement of time, the clocks varied accordingly in the nature of the edification they provided. There were religious and sectarian clocks, moral clocks, philosophical clocks, free-thinking and infidel clocks, literary and poetical clocks, educational clocks, frivolous and bacchanalian clocks. In the religious clock department were to be found Catholic, Presbyterian, Methodist, Episcopal, and Baptist time-pieces, which, in connection with the announcement of the hour and quarter, repeated some tenet of the sect with a proof text. There were also Talmage clocks, and Spurgeon clocks, and Storrs clocks, and Brooks clocks, which respectively marked the flight of time by phrases taken from the sermons of these eminent divines, and repeated in precisely the voice and accents of the original delivery. In startling proximity to the religious department I was shown the skeptical clocks. So near were they, indeed, that when, as I stood there, the various time-pieces announced the hour of ten, the war of opinions that followed was calculated to unsettle the firmest convictions. The observations of an Ingersoll which stood near me were particularly startling. The effect of an actual wrangle was the greater from the fact that all these individual clocks were surmounted by effigies of the authors of the sentiments they repeated.

I was glad to escape from this turmoil to the calmer atmosphere of the philosophical and literary clock department. For persons with a taste for antique moralizing, the sayings of Plato, Epictetus, and Marcus Aurelius had here, so to speak, been set to time. Modern wisdom was represented by a row of clocks surmounted by the heads of famous maxim-makers, from Rochefoucauld to Josh Billings. As for the literary clocks, their number and variety were endless. All the great authors were represented. Of the Dickens clocks alone there were half a dozen, with selections from his greatest stories. When I suggested that, captivating as such clocks must be, one might in time grow weary of hearing the same sentiments reiterated, the manager pointed out that the phonographic cylinders were removable, and could be replaced by other sayings by the same author or on the same theme at any time. If one tired of an author altogether, he could have the head unscrewed from the top of the clock and that of some other celebrity substituted, with a brand-new repertory.

"I can imagine," I said, "that these talking clocks must be a great resource for invalids especially, and for those who cannot sleep at night. But, on the other hand, how is it when people want or need to sleep? Is not one of them quite too interesting a companion at such a time?"

"Those who are used to it," replied the manager, "are no more disturbed by the talking clock than we used to be by the striking clock. However, to avoid all possible inconvenience to invalids, this little lever is provided, which at a touch will throw the phonograph out of gear or back again. It is customary when we put a talking or singing clock into a bedroom to put in an electric connection, so that by pressing a button at the head of the bed a person, without raising the head from the pillow, can start or stop the phonographic gear, as well as ascertain the time, on the repeater principle as applied to watches."

Hamage now said that we had only time to catch the train, but our conductor insisted that we should stop to see a novelty of phonographic invention, which, although not exactly in their line, had been sent them for exhibition by the inventor. It was a device for meeting the criticism frequently made upon the churches of a lack of attention and cordiality in welcoming strangers. It was to be placed in the lobby of the church, and had an arm extending like a pump-handle. Any stranger on taking this and moving it up and down would be welcomed in the pastor's own voice, and continue to be welcomed as long as he kept up the motion. While this welcome would be limited to general remarks of regard and esteem, ample provision was made for strangers who desired to be more particularly inquired into. A number of small buttons on the front of the contrivance bore respectively the words, "Male," "Female,". "Married," "Unmarried," "Widow," "Children," "No Children," etc., etc. By pressing the one of these buttons corresponding to his or her condition, the stranger would be addressed in terms probably quite as accurately adapted to his or her condition and needs as would be any inquiries a preoccupied clergyman would be likely to make under similar circumstances. I could readily see the necessity of some such substitute for the pastor, when I was informed that every prominent clergyman was now in the habit of supplying at least a dozen or two pulpits simultaneously, appearing by turns in one of them personally, and by phonograph in the others.

The inventor of the contrivance for welcoming strangers was, it appeared, applying the same idea to machines for discharging many other of the more perfunctory obligations of social intercourse. One being made for the convenience of the President of the United States at public receptions was provided with forty-two buttons for the different States, and others for the principal cities of the Union, so that a caller, by proper manipulation, might, while shaking a handle, be addressed in regard to his home interests with an exactness of information as remarkable as that of the traveling statesmen who rise from the gazetteer to astonish the inhabitants of Wayback Crossing with the precise figures of their town valuation and birth rate, while the engine is taking in water.

We had by this time spent so much time that on finally starting for the railroad station we had to walk quite briskly. As we were hurrying along the street, my attention was arrested by a musical sound, distinct though not loud, proceeding apparently from the indispensable which Hamage, like everybody else I had seen, wore at his side. Stopping abruptly, he stepped aside from the throng, and, lifting the indispensable quickly to his ear, touched something, and exclaiming, "Oh, yes, to be sure!" dropped the instrument to his side.

Then he said to me: "I am reminded that I promised my wife to bring home some story-books for the children when I was in town to-day. The store is only a few steps down the street." As we went along, he explained to me that nobody any longer pretended to charge his mind with the recollection of duties or engagements of any sort. Everybody depended upon his indispensable to remind him in time of all undertakings and responsibilities. This service it was able to render by virtue of a simple enough adjustment of a phonographic cylinder charged with the necessary word or phrase to the clockwork in the indispensable, so that at any time fixed upon in setting the arrangement an alarm would sound, and, the indispensable being raised to the ear, the phonograph would deliver its message, which at any subsequent time might be called up and repeated. To all persons charged with weighty responsibilities depending upon accuracy of memory for their correct discharge,