July 9. 1908] 



NA TURE 



225 



out any diminution of the effect of the orders. In like 

 manner you may inform a post-office official that you 

 are going- to alter his clock to-morrow morning-, but 

 unless you make it clear to him at the same time that 

 he has got to be at -work an hour earlier he will cer- 

 tainly regard your time-keeping with aloof interest. 

 .Anybody who has the real authority to order the day's 

 work to begin earlier will not care much about alter- 

 ing clocks. 



Nor is it likely, as the Committee seems to think, 

 that because Parliament may decide to change the 

 denomination of the hours they will thereby change 

 the meaning of all the statutes in which hours are 

 mentioned. To assume that public houses will regard 

 themselves as closed an hour earlier because the clocks 

 are moved leaves out of account the ingenuity of those 

 who are affected. Our lawyers have not altogether 

 lost their cunning; indeed, the bill might have been 

 promoted by one of that profession, for there will be 

 delightful opportunity for argument as to whether 

 12.30 a.m. "local" time (=11.30 p.m. G.M.T.) is to-day 

 or yesterday, and as to which of the two 12.30's is in 

 the' forenoon. What, indeed, shall we do with such 

 appendages as noon, a.m., and p.m.? Will the de- 

 nominations run II a.m., 12 a.m., i noon, 2 p.m., and 

 so on? If so, 12.15 a-Ti- might become quite an in- 

 teresting time for a lawyer. 



Into this whirl of confusion of ideas it seems hardly 

 safe to entrust a few timid scientific considerations. 

 That we should have a system of keeping time under 

 which, in spite of all principles of continuity of 

 measurement, the numbers between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. 

 on the third .Sunday in September will be travelled 

 over twice, and the same numbers will have different 

 meanings, would be roughly brushed aside by the re- 

 mark that as nothing happens between 2 and 3 

 on the third Sunday in September it does not matter. 

 It is the bold assurance of knowledge of the important 

 and the unimportant which strikes the cautious 

 scientific observer with a cold shudder. On the stair- 

 case leading to the committee room where this docu- 

 ment has been evolved there is an inscription to the 

 effect that copies of the imperial standards of length 

 and weight are built into the wall to make sure that 

 they shall never again be lost through fire. Reading 

 this in passing, one carries away an impressive idea of 

 the sanctity of standards, to find that in the com- 

 mittee room such an idea is regarded as quite early- 

 Victorian. If it would make things more comfortable 

 for a majority of the electors to have an inch off the 

 standard yard, why not have it off ? The vard is there ; 

 you have only to dig it up. There is no difficulty about 

 it. Those people who would be inconvenienced 

 can use the old vard if they lil'ce, ;ind, anyway, they 

 do not count. 



What is true of the immured standards, the result of 

 prolonged labour of a Royal Commission, is equally 

 true of the time standard which represents generations 

 of eminently successful work at the Royal Observ- 

 atory. Yet how can one convey to legislators that 

 a fluctuating standard is unscientific, and that by 

 scientific one means suitable for general acceptance, 

 and for permanent use, and not merely suitable for a 

 few persons of special occupation and training? Are 

 thev onlv to be convinced by the method of trial and 

 failure, the crudest, the most childish of all methods, 

 that the relations of science and practical life are in- 

 describablv numerous ; that if they adopt a scheme of 

 time designation that has no scientific basis it must 

 result in failure, however bold its promoters may be 

 in rejecting eighths or neglecting quarters : that the 

 .-idvance from the " local " time of fifty years ago to 

 " standard " time of to-day was a step well thought 

 out, and one that cannot be reversed by the introduc- 



NO. 20ig, VOL. 78] 



tion of a new and really nondescript time under the 

 old name? 



Of course, there remain the great salient objects, 

 the earlier hours of work in summer combined with 

 the undisturbed Bradshaw and the continuity of 

 the Postal Guide. Compared with these the con- 

 tinuity of time measurement is dismissed as a slight 

 matter of no importance to practical people, a piece of 

 scientific pedantry. But let it be remembered that 

 the whole structure which Bradshaw and the 

 Postal Guide represent has been reared upon the 

 basis of an unalterable standard time, and that not 

 even the most experienced legislator can follow out the 

 consequences of taking out the corner-stone of that 

 structure. 



In the meantime there is plenty of room for the 

 activity of reformers in the direction of earlier hours. 

 It may be noticed that a large majority of workers, 

 both in town and country, whose work does not depend 

 upon facilities for correspondence, already commence 

 work at 6 a.m., and for them noon is the central 

 hour of the day. The latest people are the office people, 

 who wait for their letters to be sorted. In these days 

 of competition, if there is an early worm anywhere the 

 early bird will not be very far off, and attendance is 

 governed by facilities. It is a curious fact that, al- 

 though early train facilities are so plentiful and so 

 cheap, except on Sundays, that many clerks come to 

 London in advance of their business hours because 

 they can lake advantage of them, there are only two 

 post offices in the London area open for the transaction 

 of telegraphic business before 8 a.m. on Sundays and 

 barely a dozen on week days ; in the country 

 districts there are none. Early telegraphic facili- 

 ties are formulated upon quite the opposite prin- 

 ciple from that of workmen's trains; they are very 

 expensive. Yet anyone blessed with a neighbour who 

 is engaged in having his house built, altered, repaired, 

 or painted will be aware that 8 a.m. is a very belated 

 shot at the commencement of the working day. The 

 conclusion that one comes to is that the number of 

 people for whom postal and telegraphic facilities are 

 matters of business, and who therefore keep late 

 hours, are relatively few. To change the hour of 

 work for the millions who begin at six in order to 

 give the thousands that begin at 10 an extra hour of 

 daylight, which is already theirs if they like to use 

 it, seems no more reasonable than to disregard the 

 requirements of Continental correspondence, as the 

 Committee does, because it is only one-eighth of the 

 whole. 



Finallv, there is another quite interesting confusion 

 of ideas about the purpose of the bill. Its promoters 

 are sanguine that when it is passed there will be 

 longer use of daylight for outdoor sports and exercise 

 with the same time for work, recreation and sleep as 

 before, and yet the day is to remain twenty-four hours. 



For most people the days are pretty full already. 

 " Six days shalt thou labour and do all that thou hast 

 to do " is a commandment which many people find it 

 very hard to keep. To put in an extra hour's occupation 

 in the day would not be possible for them. To make 

 up for the light hour saved, a dark hour ought to be 

 cut off. 



When the bill is in operation there will be exactly 

 the same interval between leaving off work and 

 the commencement of the " halls " as before. If the 

 workers take advantage of the extra hour of daylight 

 for open-air recreation, which comes to them as a sort 

 of free gift bv a manipulation of the clocks, it is much 

 to be feared that there will arise a strong temptation 

 to crowd the day, already so overcrowded that no time 

 is left for such an occupation as reading, with an ad- 

 ditional hour of glorious life reckless of the loss of 



