Feb. 8. 1851.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



107 



the close of the seventeenth century, the sister of 

 Dr. Hugh Boulter (who became chaplain to 

 George I., and afterwards Lord Archbishop of 

 Armagh). Blowen. 



touchstone's dial. 



(Vol. ii., p. 405. ; vol. iii., p. 52.) 



How is it that Mr. Knight, who so well and so 

 judiciously exposes the absurdness of attempting 

 to measure out a poet's imaginings by riile-and- 

 compass probability, should himself endeavour to 

 embody and identify Touchstone's dial — an ideal 

 image — a mere peg on which to hang the fool's 

 sapient moralizing ? 



Surely, whether it was a real moving animated 

 pocket watch, that was present to the poet's mind, 

 or a thumb ring dial, is an inquiry quite as bootless 

 as the geographical existence of a sea-coast in 

 Bohemia, or of lions and serpents in the forest of 

 Ardennes. 



When Thaliard engages to take away the life of 

 Pericles if he can get him within his " pistol's 

 length," are we seriously to inquire whether the 

 weapon was an Italian dagger or an English fire- 

 arm ? or are we to debate which of the interpre- 

 tations woidd be the lesser anachronism? 



But your correspondents (Vol. ii., p. 405. and 

 vol. iii., p. 52.) approve of, and confirm Mr. 

 Knight's suggestion of a ring dial, as though it 

 were so self-evident as to admit of no denial. 

 Nevertheless, neither he nor they have shown any 

 good reason for its adoption : even its superior 

 antiquity over the portable time-piece is mere 

 surmise on their parts, unaccompanied as yet by 

 any direct proof In point of fact, the sole argu- 

 ment advanced by Mr. Knight why Touchstone's 

 dial should be a ring dial is, that " it was not likely 

 that the fool would have a pocket watch." Well, but 

 it might belong to Celia, carried away with the 

 "jewels and wealth" she speaks of, and, on account 

 of the unwieldy size of watches in those days, in- 

 trusted to the porterage of the able-bodied fool. 



When Touchstone said, so very wisely, " It is 

 ten o''clock,'" he used a phrase which, according to 

 Orlando in the same play, could oidy properly 

 apply to a mechanical time-piece. Rosalind asks 

 Orlando, " I pray you what is it a clock f to which 

 he replies, " You should ask me what time o' da>/ ; 

 there's no clock in the forest." Again, when 

 Jacques declares that he did laugh "an hour by 

 his dial," do we not immediately recall Falstaff''s 

 similar j)hrase, " an hour by Shrewsbury clock ? " 



If it shall be said that the word " dial " is more 

 used in reference to a natural than to a mechanical 

 indicator of time, I should point, in reply, to 

 Hotspur's allusion : 



" 'J'ho' life did ride upon a dial's point 

 Still ending with the arrival of an hour." 



The " dial's point," so referred to, must be in 

 motion, and is therefore the hand or pointer of a 

 mechanical clock. 



A further confirmation that the Shakspearian 

 " dial " was a piece of mechanism may be seen in 

 Lafeu's reply to Bertram, when he exclaims, 



" Then my dial goes not true," 



using it as a metaphor to imply that his judgment 

 must have been deceived. 



These are some of the considerations that would 

 induce me to reject Mr. Knight's interpretation, 

 and, were it necessa?-y to realize the scene between 

 Jacques and Touchstone at all, I should prefer 

 doing so by imagining some old turnip-faced 

 atrocity in clock-making presented to the fool's 

 lack-lustre eye, than the nice astronomical observa- 

 tion supposed by Mr. Knight. 



The ring-dial, as described by him, and by your 

 correspondents, is likewise described in most of 

 the encyclopcedias. It is available for the latitude 

 of construction only, and was no doubt common 

 enough a hundred years ago ; but it is scarcely an 

 object as yet for deposit in the British Museum. 



A. E. B. 



Leeds, Jan. 23. 1851. 



The Ring Dial, perhaps the most elegant in 

 principle of all the forms of sun dial, has not, 

 I think, fallen into greater disuse than have sun 

 dials of other constructions. To describe, in this 

 place, a modern ring dial, and the method of using 

 it, would be useless : because it is an instrument 

 which may be so readily inspected in the shops of 

 most of the London opticians. JMessrs, Troughton 

 and Simms, of Flest Street, make ring dials to a 

 pattern of about six inches in diameter, costing, in 

 a case, 21. 6s. They aie, in truth, elegant and 

 instructive astronomical toys, to say the least of 

 them ; and indicate the solar time to the accuracy 

 of about two minutes, when the sun is pretty high. 



Formerly, ring dials were made of a larger 

 diameter, with much costly graduation bestowed 

 upon them ; too heavy to be portable, and too 

 expensive for the occasion. For example, at the 

 apartments of the Royal Astronomical Society, at 

 Somerset House, a ring dial, eighteen inches in 

 diameter, may be seen, constructed by Abraham 

 Sharp, contemporary and correspondent of New- 

 ton and Flamstead ; one similar to which, hazard- 

 ing a guess, I should say, could not be made under 

 \00l. At the same place also may be seen, be- 

 longing to Mr. AVilliams, the assistant-secretary of 

 the society, a very handsome oriental astrolabe, 

 about four inches in diameter, richly chased with 

 Arabic characters and symbols; to which instru- 

 ment, as well as to modern ring dials, the ring 

 dials described in "Notes and Queries" (Vol. iii., 

 p. 52.) seem to bear relation. If I recollect right, 

 in one of the tales of the Arabian Nights, the 

 barber goes out, leaving his customer half shaved, 



