Notes
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COLLINS'S USE OF THE STRASBOURG
CLOCK IN ARMADALE
XWriting to his wifefromthe Hotel de Paris,
Strasbourgon the "fineand fresh"afternoonof 13 October 1853,
Charles Dickens reportedthathe was enjoyinga "mostdelightful"
(thoughbrief)visitto the city,"havingjust seen and heard the clock
in theCathedralachieveitsusual noon performance."' A fewdayslater
one of Dickens'scompanionson the trip,WilkieCollins,expresseda
similarresponseto the sightsof Strasbourgin a letterthatdescribed
the "fantasticpuppet show . . . everytime 12 o'clockstrikes."2
What
both Dickensand Collinsso enthusiastically observedwas, of course,
the famousmonumentalStrasbourgCathedralclock-an objectthat
guide books (then,as now) recommendedas worthyof the tourist's
A dozen yearsafterCollins firstsaw the clock,a
special attention.3
? 1991byThe Regentsof theUniversity
of California
'Mr. and Mrs. CharlesDickens:His LetterstoHer, ed. Walter Dexter (London: Con-
stable & Co., 1935), pp. 177-78.
2Quoted by Fred Kaplan in Dickens: A Biography(New York: William Morrow,
1988), p. 292.
3Thomas Frognall Dibdin, in the second volume of the second edition of his
Antiquarian,and PicturesqueTourin Franceand Germany(London: Rob-
Bibliographical,
ertJenningsandJohn Major, 1829), p. 390, reported thatthe clock and the cathedral
"were called the two great wonders of Germany."See also John Barnes's description
of the "beautiful Gothic structure" of the cathedral with its "admirable piece of
[clock] mechanism" in A Tour Throughoutthe Wholeof France (London: W. Darton,
495
496 NINETEENTH-CENTURY LITERATURE
"model" of it appears in his fiction.The followingdiscussion attempts
to suggest reasons for Collins'schoice of thisparticularclock by briefly
describing the actual appearance of the Strasbourg mechanism; the
theological and philosophical traditionssurrounding it; and the sig-
nificanceof Collins's use of the object as the basis for Major Milroy's
model in Armadale.
Even ifCollins had not actuallyviewed the clock,the contemporary
record suggests that he mightwell have read about it or seen it illus-
tratedin a periodical. Interestin the Strasbourgclock appears to have
been renewed when, after a silence of fiftyyears, it was rebuilt and
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modernized byJean-BaptisteSchwilguein the mid-nineteenthcentury.
The firstStrasbourg clock of 1354, a great medieval astronomicalar-
tifact,was principallya "mechanical model to representthe motionsof
the heavens,"4 and was completewithan automated astrolabe,calendar,
carillon, and automatons, including the famous mechanical crowing
cock. As magnificentas the medieval clock was, however,the second
clock finishedunder the directionof Conrad Dasypodius in 1574 rep-
resented "the pinnacle in the development of [the] monumental as-
tronomical clocks"; "the technological wonder of its age," it inspired
miniaturereplicas and imitationsas well as referencesor descriptions
in some four hundred printed works.5It was this restored clock that
nineteenth-century LondonNews
touristsflockedto see. As TheIllustrated
reported on 28 January 1843, "the interestof this master-piece of
mechanism . . . has 'taken a new turn' by its having been recently re-
paired, and exhibitedto the ScientificCongress,held a shorttimesince
at Strasburg" (p. 53).
Like the firstcathedral clock, the second representedan imitation
of the structureof the world withina religiouscontext.Natural history,
astronomy,the monarchies of the ancient world, the three fates, the
four ages of human life, the sacramental historyof Creation, Resur-
rection, and the Last Judgment-all (and more) were represented
through automatons (or "puppetry"), models, and paintings on the
1815), p. 78, and Dickens's comments on the "famous mechanical clock" in his 1846
work PicturesfromItaly, ed. David Paroissien (New York: Coward, McCann and
Geoghegan, 1974), p. 144.
4F.C. Haber, "The Cathedral Clock and the Cosmological Clock Metaphor," in
The Studyof TimeII: Proceedingsof theSecondConference of theInternationalSociety
for
theStudyofTime,edJ. T. Fraser and N. Lawrence (New York: Springer-Verlag,1975),
p. 399.
5Francis C. Haber, "The Darwinian Revolution in the Concept of Time," in The
Studyof Time: Proceedingsof theFirstConference of theInternationalSociety
for theStudy
of Time,ed. J. T. Fraser, F. C. Haber, and G. H. Miller (New York: Springer-Verlag,
1972), p. 391.
NOTES 497
twenty-five-foot
bysixty-footstructure.Timekeeping was almostan af-
terthoughtcompared with the clock's great symbolicsignificanceas a
microcosm of the world. As Francis C. Haber writes:
What one saw was a Theater of the World .. . [or] a mechanized cosmic
poem.... Du Bartas,incidentally, totheStrasbourg
had a reference clockwhen
he sangthepraisesof man,whowithhismortalhandscouldmakea modelof
theGreatArchitect'sCreation.The positionof theclockinsidetheCathedral
was fittingindeed, for it was a huge visual aid . . . rehearsingthe meaning of
lifeand theepitomeof themicrocosm-macrocosm
relationship.
("DarwinianRevolution,"p. 392)
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The Strasbourg clock was constructedas a "model of the Great Ar-
chitect'sCreation"; itis not at all surprising,then,nor is itwithoutirony,
thatitwas the Strasbourgclock in particularthatbecame the "exemplar
clock in the writingson the 'new mechanical philosophy,'and notably
so in the work of Robert Boyle."6
The use of the clock metaphor to describe the orderly,predictable,
rational mechanismsof the world led to the now familiarshorthandof
phrases such as "the clockworkuniverse" and "the watchmakerGod."
It was withinthe contextsof eighteenth-and nineteenth-century nat-
ural theology in particular that the cosmological clock metaphor be-
came a commonplace. Boyle may have been one of the firstin the En-
glish tradition to compare the universe to a great clock (citing
Strasbourg specifically),but he was followed by many whose favorite
formal proof for the existence of God was the design argument-the
empirical theology"proving"thatGod existsbased upon the evidences
of pattern and design in the natural world (in its simplest form, the
idea that "order implies an orderer"). Nature exhibits the intricate
structureand the complex motions of the most elaborate clockwork;
is it not then reasonable to conclude that the most skilled artificerof
all must have created the universal mechanism? The clock reflectsits
maker; as one scholar has written,the world to late-seventeenth-
centuryEnglish scientists"was not a meaninglessturningof gears and
wheels; it was an order instinctwith the intelligenceof the Creator."7
The deploymentof the clock as a symbolof the ordered cosmos
began at least as early as the time of Cicero, but was most popular in
the seventeenthand eighteenthcenturiesin the worksof philosophers
6FrancisC. Haber, "The Clock as Intellectual Artifact,"in The ClockworkUniverse:
GermanClocksand Automata,1550-1650, ed. Klaus Maurice and Otto Mayr (New
York: Neale Watson Academic Publications, 1980), p. 18.
7RichardS. Westfall,Scienceand Religionin Seventeenth-Century
England (1958; Ann
Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, 1973), p. 27.
498 NINETEENTH-CENTURY LITERATURE
such as Locke, Descartes,Lord Herbertof Cherbury,Leibniz,Nieu-
wentyt, Fontenelle,and, of course,Paley.Althoughtheclockanalogue
beganto fallout ofintellectualfavorin thelatterpartoftheeighteenth
century,Samuel L. Maceypointsout that"duringthe period 1760-
1860, theologiansand the bourgeoisiefavouredthe argumentfrom
designbased on a clockworkmodel,whereasphilosophersand scien-
tiststurned theirbacks on it."8Certainlywhen Collins was writingAr-
madalethe foundationof thedesignargument'suse of theclockmet-
aphor-the idea thata clockreflects itsmaker-would have been one
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of the recognizableassociationsthatthe literaryimage of the clock
mightconvey.Collins'schoiceoftheStrasbourg clockforMajorMilroy's
modelinArmadale strongly suggeststhathe wishedtoinvoketheimage
of theclockas an "intellectual artifact"thatillustrated
ideas about the
natureof theworld.
Collins'sArmadaleisintricately
plotted-almostlikeclockwork itself
in itselaboratecomplexity-anddeeplyconcernedwiththeworking-
out of livesin timeand withtheissuesof determinism, freewill,prov-
idence,and chancethatthepatternof thoselivesinvitesus to consider.
Crudelysimplified, thenovelplayswiththequestionofwhethera crime
in the past (in whichAllan Armadalemurdershis namesake)willbe
repeatedin thelivesof thesons,who (in an ominousduplication)are
also namedAllanArmadale.Focusingon therelationship betweenthe
twojunior Allan Armadales(one of whomconcealshis real name be-
neaththe alias Ozias Midwinter), the noveldescribeshow the twobe-
comeclosefriends;howthe"dark-haired" Allan(hereafter referredto
as Midwinter)discoverstheburdensomeknowledgethathe is theson
of a murdererand, his fatherfears,is destinedto repeatthe crime;
and how the twojunior Armadales take up residenceat Thorpe-
Ambrose,an estatethatthe "light-haired" Allan has suddenlyinher-
ited.At thispoint(a quarterwayintothenovel)MajorMilroy, a retired
armyofficer, entersas the tenantof the cottageon the estate.Dra-
matically,Major Milroyis important as theprotectivefatherofEleanor
Milroy(a youngwomanwithwhomthe "light-haired" Allan becomes
romantically involved),as thehusbandof an invalidand jealous wife,
and as theemployerof a governess, thedangerousLydiaGwilt(whose
8Patriarchs of Time: Dualism in Saturn-Cronus,
FatherTime,theWatchmaker God, and
FatherChristmas(Athens, Georgia: Univ. of Georgia Press, 1987), p. xii. See also Ma-
cey's earlier volume, Clocksand theCosmos:Timein Western
Lifeand Thought(Hamden,
Conn.: Archon, 1980).
NOTES 499
desire forAllan'sinheritanceleads her to attempthis murder).The-
matically,Major Milroyis important as a clockmaker.
For readersfamiliarwiththereal thing,the major's"littleexper-
iment"(p. 194) on the "modelof the famousclockat Strasbourg"(p.
152) mustinviteinvidiouscomparisons.9 Ratherthanconvincingly cel-
ebrating the ordered and comprehensible providentialdesign of the
worldand of humanlife,theproductof MajorMilroy's"extraordinary
mechanicalgenius"(p. 152) is an ill-working fragmentthatseems to
embodyuncertainty, failure,and the unpredictable.Whilehe some-
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whatdisingenuously insiststhat"thereis nothingelse of thekind"like
theStrasbourgclockintheworld,Milroyalso concedesthat"theredoes
happen to be thisone pointof resemblancebetweenthe greatclock
abroad and thelittleclockat home,thattheybothshowwhattheycan
do on the strokeof noon" (p. 194). The man who has "passed whole
yearsof his lifein tryingto imitate"(p. 194) the complexmachinery
at Strasbourginviteshis gueststo attendto his"wonderful clock"in its
noon performance.
At thebase of theStrasbourgclockthereis "a globeborneon the
wingsof a pelican,roundwhichrevolvethesun and moon,themech-
anismbeingin thebodyofthebird"(Illustrated LondonNews,28 January
1843). At thebase of themajor'sclockthereis "a roughwoodencase"
containingthemachinery, whilethepedestalof theclockis "placedon
rockwork"(p. 195). The "greatclockabroad"representsa world(the
celestialglobe) supportedbya caringand lovingGod (thepelicanis a
symbolofChrist),and sustained(quiteliterally, bytheclockmechanism
insidethe carvedbody)byProvidence;the "littleclockat home" sug-
gestsa worldof roughlyhewnutilitarianmechanismplaced on the
rockycrustof geologicaltime.On the top of Major Milroy'spedestal
sitsthe"inevitablefigureof Time" who,at thestrokeof twelve,moves
hisscytheto pointtoa littleprintedcardthatindicatesthedate.Crown-
ing the Strasbourgclockis the famousmechanicalcock who, at the
strokeof twelve,crowsthreetimesto the accompaniment of psalms
whilea processionof apostlespassesby,therebyremindingonlookers
of Peter'sbetrayalof Christ;automatedfiguresof Death (striking the
hourswitha bone) and of Christalso confronteach other.In place of
thegreatclock'srehearsalof thepatternsof humanlifewithinthesac-
ramentalcontextof divinehistory, the Major'slittleclockreducesthe
passingof timeto themostmundane,inconsequential, and trivialized
9References are to the Dover edition reprint (New York, 1977) of the firstserial
publication of Armadalein The CornhillMagazine, November 1864 to June 1866.
500 NINETEENTH-CENTURY LITERATURE
series of activities.Instead of psalms, the littleclock plays the tune of
a favoritemarch of the major's old regiment,while automated figures
of a sentinel,corporal, and two privatesattemptto "march across the
platformto relieve the guard" (p. 195). The major explains:
I mustask yourkindallowancesforthislast partof the performance. The
machinery and therearedefectsinitwhichI am ashamed
is a littlecomplicated,
to say I have notyetsucceededin remedying as I could wish.Sometimesthe
figuresgo all wrong,and sometimes theygo all right. (pp. 195-96)
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In the marred creationof his personal model of the world, Milroy
remindsus, perhaps, of Sterne'sUncle Toby and his retreatintoa world
of militarynostalgia and fortifications. Even more relevant as a com-
ment on Collins's fictionalworld in Armadale,however,is Tristram's(or
Sterne's) response to the divinelyordered and designed universe of
eighteenth-century"providential"narrative: "This, Sir, is a very dif-
ferent story from that of the earth's moving round her axis, in her
diurnal rotation,withher progress in her elliptickorbitwhich brings
about the year. .".. The "changing of the guard" motion that the
major's clock seeks to enact pointsto a kind of "changingof the guard"
in narrative,too: while the possibilityof a providentialorder is not
totallydismissed,there is no longer a sense of predictabilityor assured
faithin an ultimatedesign. Instead thereare defects,failures,and the
randomness of figureswho sometimes"go all wrong" and sometimes
"go all right."
In performance,Major Milroy's"littleclock"becomes an analogue
for disorder; the automatons totter,tremble, and dash themselves
"headlong against the closed door" (p. 196). Amidst the "fantasticab-
surdityof the exhibition,""an intermittentclicking,as of the major's
keysand tools at work,was heard in the machinery"(p. 196); tryas he
may, however, the tired clockmaker'sattemptsat interventionfail to
prevent "the catastrophe of the puppets" (p. 197). The entire scene
ends with the "convulsive violence" of Midwinter's "paroxysms of
laughter" (p. 197) shaking the foundationsof Milroy'slittleworld.
It is perhaps an indication of the significanceof this episode that
the finalmomentof it was illustratedin the May 1865 CornhillMagazine
when the novel firstappeared. The great Strasbourg clock, in all its
monumental glory,was frequentlyillustratedin periodicals and in
Shandy,Gentleman,ed. James
I?Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinionsof Tristram
Aiken Work (1940; rpt. New York: Macmillan, 1985), p. 73.
NOTES 501
books about horology." These illustrationsshow the complete mech-
anism fromthe base of the centraltowerto itscrowneddome, including
the spiral staircaseon one side and the northtowersurmountedby the
mechanical cock on the other; the automata are depicted strikingthe
hour, and the more elaborate engravingsinclude details of the painted
panels. The illustrationabove the caption "The Major's Clock" stands
in starkcontrast.Here the incompletenessand fragmentarynature of
the major's effortsare fullyexposed: readers see the impotentcreator
with his clock-workinghammer hanging limplyfrom his hand, a sen-
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tinel collapsed against his sentrybox, and the scytheof Time loosely
dangling in a line parallel to that of the major's hammer. Only a part
of the model is visible,two-thirdsof the picture having been devoted
to the depiction of the overwrought,hystericalresponse of Midwinter.
In presentingMajor Milroy'sconstructionas a faultymodel of an-
other model and as a work in progress,Collins reenvisionsthe idea of
the clock,transformingitfroman expressionof order to an expression
of the desire for order. What the major's project emphasizes is not
product but process, the strivingto impose patternand regularityon
life. The major begins his clock when his troubles begin-when the
events of his life,as disposed in time,take an unpredicted and unfor-
tunate turn. Almost simultaneouslyhis wife'shealth collapses and his
own fortuneis lost; "fromthatmoment,the domestichappiness of the
married pair was virtuallyat an end" (p. 274). For the major, clock-
makingbecomes a retreatfromthe vicissitudesof life:"Having reached
the age when men in general are readier, under the pressure of ca-
lamity,to resign themselvesthan to resist,the major had secured the
littlerelics of his property,had retired into the country,and had pa-
tientlytaken refuge in his mechanical pursuits" (p. 274). Robbed by
time of "the spiritof his happier youth" (p. 154), of the "cheerfulold
times"(p. 220), Milroyis now "deeply immersedin his wonderfulclock"
(p. 177), so that the outer world becomes distantand less threatening,
and the smaller,personal world of his own constructionbegins to as-
sume the place of reality.
Frustratedby time, Major Milroy takes up a hobby in which he
seeks to master time,to render events in a regular,predictable form.
Real change (sickness,decay,and death) are denied, as he nostalgically
"See, for example, The Mirror,3 April 1824, p. 209; TheIllustratedLondonNews,
28 January 1843, p. 53; Edward J. Wood, Curiositiesof Clocksand Watches fromthe
EarliestTimes(London, 1866), publishedbyRichardBentley(Collins'spublisherfor
a time), frontispiece;James Francis Kendal, A HistoryofWatches
and OtherTimekeepers
(London: CrosbyLockwoodand Son, 1892), p. 84, Fig. 24.
502 NINETEENTH-CENTURY LITERATURE
recalls his old regimentand attemptsto create a personally pleasing
pattern for life based on the daily changing of the guard. By a psy-
chological sleightof hand the major metamorphosesthe turmoilin his
life into a problem of clockmaking,where he seeks repetitionwithout
alteration and a simple, more knowable model of the world. The ar-
tificialquest for order thus springsfroma currentlack of order, from
a sense of loss that engulfs the major. A bewildered figure,the major
is "an old-fashioned man" (p. 309) caught up in a world in transition,
tryingto shore up or find replacements for cultural truths that no
longer stand firm.His clock is his versionof a world of design, and his
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appeals to honor (to cite an analogous desire for a system)represent
his attempt to affirma moral universe. Yet his clock does not work
properly,and its counterpart,the "code of honour ... which ... reg-
ulated [his] actions" (p. 309), leads him in his naivete to seriouslymis-
judge Allan and later,as the conspirator Gwilt notes, to smooth "the
way for [her], as completelyas if he had been [her] chosen accomplice"
(p. 441).
The storyof Major Milroyand his clock emphasizes Collins's per-
ception of irregularityand confusion in the world. In depicting the
major's "littleclock at home" (p. 194) as a secular, even private model
of order, Collins parodies the notion of "the clockworkuniverse."Sim-
ilarly,in his next novel, TheMoonstone, Collins undermines the theory
of providence, giving Defoe's portrayalof Crusoe's sortesbiblicae(his
random openings of the Bible to discoverdivineguidance) a revisionary
twist,as Gabriel Betteredge pretends to findprovidentialguidance for
his life in reading the secular textof RobinsonCrusoe.'2By describing
Major Milroyand Gabriel Betteredgeworshipingsecular constructions,
Collins expresses his skepticism:in each novel,throughthe comparison
of models, he satirizes the earlier, more sincere expression of provi-
dence, suggests the receding of the divine as an acknowledged power
in the world,and stressesthe common denominator-the human com-
pulsion to discern design and meaning. In ArmadaleMilroy'sneed for
order proceeds from a recognitionof disorder and leads, as Collins
amplifiesthe irony,to the creationof a clock thatimages thatdisorder.
"The fantasticabsurdityof the exhibition"(p. 196), which exemplifies
the gulfbetween the creatorMilroyand his creation,becomes a sugges-
tiveand unsettlingparadigm for Collins's novelisticworld in Armadale,
12William H. Marshall in WilkieCollins(New York: Twayne, 1970) has noted that
Betteredge uses RobinsonCrusoe"as Crusoe himselfused the Bible" (p. 83). Also see
Sue Lonoff, WilkieCollinsand His VictorianReaders:A Studyin theRhetoricofAuthorship
(New York: AMS Press, 1982), pp. 220-22.
NOTES 503
withitsfiguresapparentlyisolated,withoutthe guidingintentionsof
a maker,treadingperplexingpathsin lifethattheyare desperateto
understand.
BoththeStrasbourgclockand MajorMilroy'smodelfunction sym-
bolicallywithintheirrespectiveworldsof the medievalcathedraland
nineteenth-century narrative.Both representthe formand shape of
belief-both are "workingmodels"of ideas of the worldand of the
natureof reality.Ironically, itwasnotuntilitssignificance as a cultural
artifacthad been almostcompletelyunderminedthatthe Strasbourg
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clock was repaired-as brokena human inventionas Major Milroy's
clock. In ArmadaleCollinsuses the image of the deeplyflawedcon-
struction of the "littleclockat home"to challengethe model of prov-
identialorderthatthe"greatclockabroad"once so convincingly rep-
resented.In the Major MilroystoryCollinsmodifiesthe idea of the
clock,so thatitexpressesboththedisorderof theworldand, concom-
itantly,the humanattemptto overcomethatdisorder,to constructde-
signand meaning.Thus thefocusshiftsfromtheclockas an existent
form,a symbolofdesign,toclockmaking, tothehumanneed toinvent,
to compeltimeintopattern,intonarrativeform.
In Armadale, wherethe locus of dramaticsuspense(of whatwill
happennext)is also thelocusofa crucialtheme(ofwhat,ifany,design
willemergeas eventsunfold),clockmaking becomesan important met-
aphorfortheauthor's,characters', and readers'attempts tounderstand
eventsin time.Fromthe beginningof the novel,whichengendersa
moodofcuriosity and expectationoffulfillment as thecitizensofWild-
bad awaitthefirstvisitors oftheseason;tothebeginningof thesecond
book, in whichthe ReverendBrock muses on a selectionof events,
consideringiftheypossiblyforma connectedchain,a meaningful pat-
tern;to thestruggles ofOzias Midwinter, as he triestodiscernwhether
theincidentsofhislifeare spunbyfate,underthegovernanceofprov-
idence,or by chance; to the explicitirresolutionof the "Appendix,"
Collinsplayswithourdesireforsignificant designand leadsus on with-
out satisfyingit.In Armadale Collinsundoesthenovelas a closed,com-
pletedstructure, and insteadexposesthe processof invention, of fig-
urativeclockmaking, whichorganizeseventsintochainsand narrative
threads,and which,likeMajor Milroy'sproject,pushesforwardin an
interminable quest forfinalform.
LISA M. ZEITZ and PETER THOMS
ofWestern
University Ontario
