The Crock of Gold (1912)

James Stephens's comic fantasy follows the Philosopher, Meehawl MacMurrachu, leprechauns, gods, and policemen through an Irish fairy-tale quest. (Open Library)

Watches

Waterbury watch: Meehawl compares a bizarre injury story to hearing brains tick inside a skull like a Waterbury watch.

Source text: "Did you ever hear," said Meehawl, "of the man that had the scalp of his head blown off by a gun, and they soldered the bottom of a tin dish to the top of his skull the way you could hear his brains ticking inside of it for all the world like a Waterbury watch?" (Project Gutenberg ebook 1605)