Another early means of recording time applied the principle of the consumption of some slow-burning fuel by fire. From remote ages, the Chinese and Japanese thus used ropes, knotted at regular intervals, or cylinders of glue and sawdust marked in rings, which slowly smoldered away. Alfred the Great, that noble English king of the ninth [63]century, is said to have invented the candle-clock, because of a vow to give eight hours of the day to acts of religion, eight hours to public affairs, and eight hours to rest and recreation. He had six tapers made, each twelve inches long and divided into twelve parts, or inches, colored alternately black and white. Three of these parts were burned in one hour, making each inch represent twenty minutes, so that his six candles, lighted one after the other by his chaplains, would burn for twenty-four hours.

The Eskimos also, through the long arctic night have watched the la. . . Read More