FARGO, ND—Marianne Casper, 68, of this city has filed a petition in Probate Court to commit her husband Dale Casper, 71, to the North Dakota State Hospital for the Insane. She has also filed a petition in Circuit Court to end her marriage of 49 years. "It just got impossible!" said Mrs. Casper. "I could have tolerated anything - adultery, laziness, bad breath - anything but those cursed clocks!" Mrs. Casper explained to the Probate judge hearing her petition, The Honorable Madeline Braithwaite: "He began to collect clocks soon after we got married. If I had only realized what it would turn out like!" The first clock, said Mrs. Casper, was a Bavarian cuckoo clock. "I made him hang it in his den so that the sound of the cuckoo would not disturb my sleep every half hour." His next clock was an antique Seth Thomas, which he found at a garage sale and acquired for ten dollars. It chimes on the hour and half-hour. Then came a ship's clock, which sounds the hour and half-hour with bells. "I really became alarmed after we had been married about six years, when he brought home a mantle clock with Westminster chimes, which go 'bong' every quarter hour, and you tell the quarter hour by which tune they play. But I thought, it can't get any worse. How wrong I was!" Other clocks followed, all with chimes at the hour and half-hour, and two with additional chimes at the quarter-hour. "He ended up with twelve clocks, all over the house, all of them with bells, chimes, gongs, and cuckoo. There were three in the living room, six in his den, one ship's clock in the kitchen, a grandfather clock in the entryway, and even another cuckoo in his workshop in the basement." At that point in her testimony, Judge Braithwaite commented, "But surely it is not unusual, nor even a sign of insanity, that a man has a hobby of collecting things. Although I can understand your annoyance at the bells and gongs all the time." "And don't forget the cuckoos! I began to think they were actually telling me something about Mr. Casper!" She continued, "It wasn't just that! Not only was he having to wind them all, every few days (the cuckoos had to have their weights pulled up every day), it was how he acted when any of them got out of sync. You know, a minute or two slow or fast. That's when he would go crazy, running around to all the clocks with his pocket watch. His ideal was to have them all chime at exactly the same second, like an orchestra. Can you imagine the din that made? As the hour or half-hour approached, he would sit in his easy chair, breathlessly waiting for the moment when all the clocks would go off, paying attention to nothing else. On those rare occasions when they all chimed simultaneously, he would beam with pleasure and satisfaction. But more often, one or two would be off, and he would jump up angrily to rush around to identify the culprit and set it right. And remember, this happened every half hour, day in, day out, and sometimes, if he was not asleep, during the night." Judge Braithwaite set a date next month for a psychological evaluation by a court-appointed psychiatrist, Tuesday the tenth, at ten o'clock. "I assure you, Your Honor, that he won't be late," said Mrs. Casper.