10 AUGUST 1929, Page 18

Dom Ethelbert Home has written a charming monograph on Scratch

Dials (Simpkin, Marshall, 2s. ad.), with sixteen illustrations showing how these indicators of the hours of service in our country churches were fashioned, chiefly by the local builders and masons, and sometimes, no doubt, by the parish priest himself. A Mass clock and a sun-dial are more complicated instruments ; the scratch dial merely marked the hour for Mass. They are to be found all over the country, especially in Somerset, but five centuries of weather have obliterated many of them and it is well that the remnant should be saved from the ruthless hand of Time. These signs played an important part in the lives of our ancestors : to-day they remind us of a simpler and serener age.