(Continued {ros page 94.) that at some remote date Big Ben would set the time for the British Empire. These prophecies have now come true. The first broadcast from Big Ben in 1923 was, in those far-Off days, quite a daring experiment, The frst sonorous tones were picked up from a microphone placed on the }root of an adjoining building. 'Then microphone was housed in a football bladder and hung permanently in the tower. Unfortunately, the Jpigec:.. which swarm inside and outside' the tower either fancied themselves as budding League Champions Jor broadcasters, so that later' the microphone was' encased, as now, in specially-insulated container beyond, the reach of pigeons and damp. Although the noise of Big Ben is almost deafening to the human ear, It ts extraordinary that the pigeons can lay their eggs and rear their ]young in close proximity to the great bell, Big Ben weighs thirteen and a half tons. The clock is the largest striking clock in the world, pendulum is fifteen feet long and. weighs six hundred and eighty pounds, Each of the dials is twenty-two feet, six inches in diameter. The hands are fourteen feet long. The chimes, with which the listeners are 50 familiar, are said to have been set to the lines:—
"All through this hour, "Lord, be my Guide, "And wy Thy Bo "Ne foot shalt sides?
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.