re," he adds, "I humbly conceive that, in such a difficulty,
it may be more safe, for the present, to let a guilty person live till
further discovery than to put an innocent person to death."

Happily this mania speedily passed, and troubled New England no more.
Robert Pike lived many years longer, and died in 1706, when he was
nearly ninety-one years of age. He was a farmer, and gained a
considerable estate, the whole of which he gave away to his heirs before
his death. The house in which he lived is still standing in the town of
Salisbury, and belongs to his descendants; for on that healthy coast
men, families, and houses decay very slowly. James S. Pike, one of his
descendants, the well-remembered "J. S. P." of the "Tribune's" earlier
day, and now an honored citizen of Maine, has recently written a little
book about this ancient hero who assisted to set his fellow-citizens
right when they were going wrong.

GEORGE GRAHAM,

CLOCK-MAKER, BURIED IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

It is supposed that the oldest clock in existence is one in the ancient
castle of Dover, on the southern coast of England, bearing the date,
1348. It has been running, therefore, five hundred and thirty-six years.
Other clocks of the same century exist in various parts of Europe, the
works of which have but one hand, which points the hour, and require
winding every twenty-four hours. From the fact of so many large clocks
of that period having been preserved in whole or in part, it is highly
probable that the clock was then an old invention.

But how did people measure time during the countless ages that rolled
away before the invention of the clock? The first time-measurer was
probably a post stuck in the ground, the shadow of which, varying in
length and direction, indicated the time of day, whenever the sun was
not obscured by clouds. The sun-dial, which was an improvement upon
this, was known to the ancient Jews and Greeks. The ancient Chinese and
Egyptians possessed an instrument called the Clepsydra (water-stealer),
which was merely a vessel full of water with a small hole in the bottom
by which the water slowly escaped. There were marks in the inside of the
vessel which showed the hour. An improvement upon this was made about
two hundred and thirty-five years before Christ by an Egyptian, who
caused the escaping water to turn a system of wheels; and the motion was
communicated to a rod which pointed to the hours upon a circle
resembling