TIME-EECKONING. 



117 



It is obvious that to retain the old custom of reckoning hours, and 

 at the same time secure the advantages of the cosmopolitan or non- 

 local system, dual time-keepers, but not necessarily two distinct sets 

 of time-keepers, would be required. This object is attained by having 

 two dials to the one time-keeper, placed, in the case of a watch, back 

 to back, or in the case of a stationary clock, side by side, as in Fig. 2 ; 



Fig. 2. 



Local Time. 



Cosmopolitan Time. 



the instruments being constructed so that the same wheel-work would 

 move the hands of both dials. The figure No. 2 is suggested for a. 

 stationary clock ] the night half of the dials are shaded. 



The dial with the Roman numerals is designed for local time, while 

 the lettered dial is for cosmopolitan or non-local time, to be used in 

 connection with railways, steamboats and telegraphs, and as a record 

 of passing historical events. 



It is obvious that if clocks and watches were constructed on these 

 principles, the difficulties and inconveniences which have been alluded 

 to, and which seem inseparable from the present system, would be 

 fully met. Assuming the scheme to be in general use : while local 

 time would be employed for all domestic and ordinaiy purposes, 

 cosmopolitan time would be used for all purposes not local ; every 

 telegraph, every steam line, indeed every communication on the face 

 of the earth, would be worked by the same standard. Every traveller 

 having a good watch, would carry with him the precise time that he 

 would find observed elsewhere. Post meridian could never be mis- 

 taken for ante meridian. Railway and steamboat time-tables would 

 be simplified and rendered intelligible, and no one can claim that 

 such now is the rule. 



