old English bracket clock that I took myself to a wholesale firm of clock-makers to be repaired. Whilst in the shop I noticed a peculiar piece of mechanism, the purpose of which puzzled me, so I sought for information. "Oh!" replied one of the firm, "that's a special order for a temple in China; it is to work an idol and make him move." This is an absolute fact. Presumably that clock-maker was an excellent Christian in his own estimation. I do not know whether there was anything in my look that he considered called for an explanation, but he added, "Business is business, you know; you'd be astonished what funny orders we sometimes have in our trade. Only the other day a firm sounded us if we would undertake to make some imitation 'genuine' Elizabethan clocks; they sent us one to copy. But we replied declining, merely stating that we had so far conducted our business honestly, and intended always to do so." So, according to the ethics of our informant, it is not dishonest to make clock-work intended to secretly make an idol move, but it is dishonest to make imitation medieval clocks! Such are the refinements of modern commerce!
Now, after this over-long digression, to return to the interior of Spilsby church, here we discovered a number of very interesting and some curious monuments to the Willoughby family, in a side chapel railed off from the nave. On one of the altar-tombs is the recumbent effigy of John, the first Baron Willoughby, and Joan, his wife. The baron is represented in full armour, with shield and sword
