THE BOOK OF DAYS.

sculptures of Egypt are held by scholars to race saw light and darkness exchange possession imply that there was a political fabric of the of the earth-which gave themselves a waking monarchical kind in that country thirty-four and a sleeping time, and periodicised many centuries before the commencement of our pre- others of their personal needs, powers, and sensent era. Rude weapons and implements of sations, as well as a vast variety of the obvious prostone, flint, and bone, found interred in countries cesses of external nature must have impressed now occupied by civilised people, point, in like them as soon as reflection dawned in their manner, to the existence of savage nations in minds; and the DAY, we may be very sure, therethose regions at a time long before the com- fore, was amongst the first of human ideas. mencement of history. Geology, or the exami- While thus obvious and thus important, the nation of the crust of the earth, still further Day, to man's experience, is a space of time too prolongs our backward view of time. It shews frequently repeated, and amounting consequently that the earth has passed through a succession to too large numbers, to be readily available in any of physical changes, extending over a great sort of historic reckoning or reference. It is equally series of ages; that during the same time vege- evident that, for such purposes, the year is a table and animal life underwent great changes; period too large to be in any great degree availchanges of one set of species for others; an able, until mankind have advanced considerably advancement from invertebrate to vertebrate in mental culture. We accordingly find that, animals, from fishes to reptiles, from reptiles to amongst rude nations, the intermediate space of birds and mammifers; of these man coming in time marked by a revolution of the moon-the the last. Thus it has happened that we could MONTH-has always been first employed for hisnow give a biography of our little world, in torical indications. This completes the series of which the four thousand years of written history natural periods or denominations of time, unless would be multiplied many times over; and yet we are to agree with those who deem the Week this vastly extended period must, after all, be to be also such, one determined by the observaregarded as but a point in that stretch of duration of the principal aspects of the moon, as half tion which we call time. All beyond, where in increase, full, half in decrease, and change, or related facts fail us above all, a beginning or simply by an arithmetical division of the month an end to time-are inconceivable; so entirely into four parts. All other denominations, as dependent is our idea of it upon measurement, hours, minutes, &c., are unquestionably arbior so purely, rather, may it be said to consist of trary, and some of them comparatively modern; in fact, deduced from clockwork, without which they could never have been measured or made sensible to us.

measurement.

What we are more immediately concerned with at present is the YEAR, the space of time required for a revolution of the earth around the sun, being about one-seventieth of the ordinary duration of a healthy human life. It is a period very interesting to us in a natural point of view, because within it are included all seasonal changes, and of it nearly everything else in our experience of the appearances of the earth and sky is merely a repetition. Standing in this relation to us, the year has very reasonably become the unit of our ordinary reckonings of time when any larger space is concerned; above all, in the statement of the progress and completion of human life. An old man is said to die full of years. His years have been few, is the affecting expression we use regarding one who has died in youth. The anniversary of an event makes an appeal to our feelings. We also speak of the history of a nation as its annals-the transactions of its succession of years. There must have been a sense of the value and importance of the year as a space of time from a very early period in the history of humanity, for even the simplest and rudest people would be sensible of 'the seasons' difference, and of the cycle which the seasons formed, and would soon begin, by observations of the rising of the stars, to ascertain roughly the space of time which that cycle occupied.

Striking, however, as the year is, and must always have been, to the senses of mankind, we can readily see that its value and character were not so liable to be appreciated as were those of the minor space of time during which the earth performed its rotation on its own axis. That space, within which the simple fathers of our

On Time.

Why sit'st thou by that ruined hall,
Thou aged carle, so stern and gray?
Dost thou its former pride recall,
Or ponder how it passed away?

Know'st thou not me? the Deep Voice cried,
So long enjoyed, so oft misused-
Alternate, in thy fickle pride,
Desired, neglected, and accused?
Before my breath, like blazing flax,
Man and his marvels pass away;
And changing empires wane and wax,
Are founded, flourish, and decay.

Redeem mine hours-the space is brief-
While in my glass the sand-grains shiver,
And measureless thy joy or grief,
When Time and thou shalt part for ever!
The Antiquary.

LONDON LEGEND OF THE CLOCK WHICH
STRUCK THIRTEEN, AND SAVED
A MAN'S LIFE.

There is a traditionary story very widely dif fused over the country, to the effect that St Paul's clock on one occasion struck thirteen at midnight, with the extraordinary result of saving the life of a sentinel accused of sleeping at his post. It is not much less than half a century

TIME AND ITS MEASURERS.

since the writer heard the tale related in a remote part of Scotland. In later times, the question has been put, Is there any historic basis for this tradition? followed by another still more pertinent, Is the alleged fact mechanically possible? and to both an affirmative answer has been given.

An obituary notice of John Hatfield, who died at his house in Glasshouse-yard, Aldersgate, on the 18th of June 1770, at the age of 102-which notice appeared in the Public Advertiser a few days afterwards-states that, when a soldier in the time of William and Mary, he was tried by a court-martial, on a charge of having fallen asleep when on duty upon the terrace at Windsor. It goes on to state-He absolutely denied the charge against him, and solemnly declared [as a proof of his having been awake at the time], that he heard St Paul's clock strike thirteen, the truth of which was much doubted by the court because of the great distance. But while he was under sentence of death, an affidavit was made by several persons that the clock actually did strike thirteen instead of twelve; whereupon he received his majesty's pardon.' It is added, that a recital of these circumstances was engraved on the coffin-plate of the old soldier, to satisfy the world of the truth of a story which has been much doubted, though he had often confirmed it to many gentlemen, and a few days before his death told it to several of his acquaintances.'

An allusion to the story occurs in a poem styled A Trip to Windsor, one of a volume published in 1774 under the title of Weeds of Parnassus, by Timothy Scribble:

The terrace walk we with surprise behold, Of which the guides have oft the story told: Hatfield, accused of sleeping on his post, Heard Paul's bell sounding, or his life had lost.' A correction, however, must here be appliednamely, that the clock which struck on this important occasion was Tom of Westminster, which was afterwards removed to St Paul's. It seems a long way for the sound to travel, and when we think of the noises which fill this bustling city even at midnight, the possibility of its being heard even in the suburbs seems faint. Yet we must recollect that London was a much quieter town a hundred and fifty years ago than now, and the fact that the tolling of St Paul's has often been heard at Windsor, is undoubted. There might, moreover, be a favourable state of the atmosphere.

As to the query, Is the striking of thirteen mechanically possible? a correspondent of the Notes and Queries has given it a satisfactory answer.* All striking clocks have two spindles for winding: one of these is for the going part, which turns the hands, and is connected with and regulated by the pendulum or balancespring. Every time that the minute hand comes to twelve, it raises a catch connected with the striking part (which has been standing still for the previous sixty minutes), and the striking work then makes as many strokes on the bell (or spring gong) as the space between the notch which the catch has left and the next notch allows. When the catch falls into the next notch, * Second Series, vii. 14.

it again stops the striking work till the minute hand reaches twelve again an hour afterwards. Now, if the catch be stiff, so as not to fall into the notch, or the notch be worn so as not to hold it, the clock will strike on till the catch does hold. . . . If a clock strike midnight and the succeeding hour together, there is thirteen at once, and very simply. . . . If the story of St Paul's clock be true, and it only happened once, it must have been from stiffness or some mechanical obstacles.'

In connection with the above London legend, it is worthy of remark that, on the morning of Thursday the 14th of March 1861, the inhabitants of the metropolis were roused by repeated strokes of the new great bell of Westminster, and most persons supposed it was for a death in the royal family. It proved, however, to be due to some derangement of the clock, for at four The and five o'clock, ten or twelve strokes were struck instead of the proper number.' gentleman who communicated this fact through the medium of the Notes and Queries, added: 'On mentioning this in the morning to a friend, who is deep in London antiquities, he observed that there is an opinion in the city that anything the matter with St Paul's great bell is an omen of ill to the royal family; and he added: "I hope the opinion will not extend to the Westminster bell." This was at 11 on Friday morning. I see this morning that it was not till 1 A.M. the lamented Duchess of Kent was considered in the least danger, and, as you are aware, she expired in less than twenty-four hours.'

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A WATCH AND
A CLOCK.

A watch differs from a clock in its having a
vibrating wheel instead of a vibrating pendu-
lum; and, as in a clock, gravity is always pulling
the pendulum down to the bottom of its arc,
which is its natural place of rest, but does not
fix it there, because the momentum acquired
during its fall from one side carries it up to an
equal height on the other-so in a watch a spring,
generally spiral, surrounding the axis of the
balance-wheel, is always pulling this towards a
middle position of rest, but does not fix it there,
because the momentum acquired during its ap-
proach to the middle position from either side
carries it just as far past on the other side, and
the spring has to begin its work again. The
balance-wheel at each vibration allows one tooth
of the adjoining wheel to pass, as the pendulum
does in a clock; and the record of the beats is
preserved by the wheel which follows. A main-
spring is used to keep up the motion of the watch,
instead of the weight used in a clock; and as a
spring acts equally well whatever be its position,
a watch keeps time though carried in the pocket,
or in a moving ship. In winding up a watch,
one turn of the axle on which the key is fixed is
rendered equivalent, by the train of wheels, to
about 400 turns or beats of the balance-wheel;
and thus the exertion, during a few seconds, of
the hand which winds up, gives motion for twenty-
four or thirty hours.-Dr. Arnott.

3

SAITA

CAESAR

The length of the year is strictly expressed by
the space of time required for the revolution
of the earth round the
sun-namely, 365 days,
5 hours, 48 minutes, 49
seconds, and 7 tenths
of a second, for to such
a nicety has this time
been ascertained. But
for convenience in reck-
oning, it has been found
necessary to make the
year terminate with a
day instead of a frac-
tion of one, lumping the fractions together so as
to make up a day among themselves. About
forty-five years before Christ, Julius Cæsar, hav-
ing, by the help of Sosigenes, an Alexandrian
philosopher, come to a tolerably clear under-
standing of the length of the year, decreed that
every fourth year should be held to consist of
366 days for the purpose of absorbing the odd
hours. The arrangement he dictated was a
rather clumsy one. A day in February, the
sixth before the calends of March (sextilis), was
to be repeated in that fourth year; and each
fourth year was thus to be bissextile. It was as
if we were to reckon the 23d of February twice
over. Seeing that, in reality, a day every fourth
year is too much by 11 minutes, 10 seconds, and
3 tenths of a second, it inevitably followed that
the beginning of the year moved onward ahead
of the point at which it was in the days of
Cæsar; in other words, the natural time fell
behind the reckoning. From the time of the
Council of Nice, in 325, when the vernal equinox
fell correctly on the 21st of March, Pope Gre-
gory found in 1582 that there had been an over-
reckoning to the extent of ten days, and now the
vernal equinox fell on the 11th of March. To
correct the past error, he decreed that the 5th of
October that year should be reckoned as the
15th, and to keep the year right in future, the
overplus being 18 hours, 37 minutes, and 10-Times, February 16, 1861.

seconds in a century, he ordered that every cen-
turial year that could not be divided by 4, (1700,
1800, 1900, 2100, 2200, &c.) should not be bissex-
tile, as it otherwise would be; thus, in short,
dropping the extra day three times every four
hundred years. The Gregorian style, as it was
called, readily obtained sway in Catholic, but
not in Protestant countries. It was not adopted
in Britain till the year 1752, by which time the
discrepancy between the Julian and Gregorian
periods amounted to eleven days. An act of par-
liament was passed, dictating that the 3d of Sep-
tember that year should be reckoned the 14th,
and that three of every four of the centurial
years should, as in Pope Gregory's arrangement,
not be bissextile or leap-years. It has conse-
quently arisen-1800 not having been a leap-
year-that the new and old styles now differ by
twelve days, our first of January being equivalent
to the 13th old style. In Russia alone, of all
Christian countries, is the old style still retained;
wherefore it becomes necessary for one writing
in that country to any foreign correspondent, to
set down his date thus: March, or
may be

or, it

12th 24th 28th December 1860 9th January 1861 ⚫

25th September 7th October

;

'The old style is still retained in the accounts of Her Majesty's Treasury. This is why the Christmas dividends are not considered due till Twelfth Day, nor the midsummer dividends till the 5th of July; and in the same way it is not until the 5th of April that Lady Day is supposed to arrive. There is another piece of antiquity visible in the public accounts. In old times, the year was held to begin on the 25th of March, and this usage is also still observed in the computations over which the Chancellor of the Exchequer presides. The consequence is, that the first day of the financial year is the 5th of April, being old Lady Day, and with that day the reckonings of our annual budgets begin and end.'

The Day.

-There came the Day and Night,
Riding together both with equal pace;
The one on palfrey black, the other white;
But Night had covered her uncomely face
With a black veil, and held in hand a mace,
On top whereof the moon and stars were pight,
And sleep and darkness round about did trace:
But Day did bear upon his sceptre's height
The goodly sun encompassed with beames bright.
Spenser.

The day of nature, being strictly the time required for one rotation of the earth on its axis,

is 23 hours, 56 minutes, 4 seconds, and 1 tenth of a second. In that time, a star comes round to appear in the same place where we had formerly seen it. But the earth, having an additional motion on its orbit round the sun, requires about 3 minutes, 56 seconds more, or 24 hours in all, to have the sun brought round to appear at the same place; in other words, for any place on the surface of the earth to come to the meridian. Thus arises the difference between a sidereal day and a solar day, between apparent and mean time, as will be more particularly explained elsewhere.

THE DAY.

Fixing our attention for the present upon the solar day, or day of mean time, let us remark in the first place that, amongst the nations of antiquity, there were no divisions of the day beyond what were indicated by sun-rise and sun-set. Even among the Romans for many ages, the only point in the earth's daily revolution of which any public notice was taken was mid-day, which they used to announce by the sound of trumpet, whenever the sun was observed shining straight along between the Forum and a place called Græcostasis. To divide the day into a certain number of parts was, as has been remarked, an arbitrary arrangement, which only could be adopted when means had been invented of mechanically measuring time. We accordingly find no allusion to hours in the course of the Scriptural histories till we come to the Book of Daniel, who lived 552 years before Christ. Then Daniel, whose name was Belteshazzar, was astonished for one hour, and his thoughts troubled him.' The Jews and the Romans alike, on introducing a division of the day into twenty-four | hours, assigned equal numbers to day and night, without regard to the varying length of these portions of the solar day; consequently, an hour was with them a varying quantity of time, according to the seasons and the latitude. Afterwards, the plan of an equal division was adopted, as was also that of dividing an hour into 60 minutes, and a minute into 60 seconds.

Before the hour division was adopted, men could only speak of such vague natural divisions as morning and evening, forenoon and afternoon, or make a reference to their meal-times. And these indications of time have still a certain hold upon us, partly because they are so natural and obvious, and partly through the effect of tradition. All before dinner is, with us, still morning-notwithstanding that the meal has nominally been postponed to an evening hour. The Scotch, long ago, had some terms of an original and poetical nature for certain periods of the day. Besides the dawin' for the dawn, they spoke of the skreigh o' day, q. d., the cry of the coming day. Their term for the dusk, the gloaming, has been much admired, and is making its way into use in England.

Intimately connected with the day is the WEEK, a division of time which, whatever trace of a natural origin some may find in it, is certainly in a great measure arbitrary, since it does not consist in all countries of the same number of

days. The week of Christian Europe, and of the Christian world generally, is, as is well known, a period of seven days, derived from the Jews, whose sacred scriptures represent it as a commemoration of the world having been created by God in six days, with one more on which he rested from his work, and which he therefore sanctified as a day of rest.

Of weeks there are 52, and one day over, in ordinary years, or two days over in leap-years; and hence the recurrence of a particular day of the month never falls in an immediately succeeding year on the same day of the week, but on one a day in advance in the one case, and two in the other. Every twenty-eight years, however,

the days of the month and the days of the week once more coincide.

The week, with its terminal day among the Jews, and its initial day among the Christians, observed as a day of rest and of devotion, is to be regarded as in the main a religious institution. Considering, however, that the days have only various names within the range of one week, and that by this period many of the ordinary operations of life are determined and arranged, it must be deemed, independently of its connection with religion, a time-division of the highest importance.

While the Romans have directly given us the names of the months, we have immediately derived those of the days of the week from the Saxons. Both among the Romans, however, and the Saxons, the several days were dedicated to the chief national deities, and in the characters of these several sets of national deities there is, in nearly every instance, an obvious analogy and correspondence; so that the Roman names of the days have undergone little more than a translation in the Saxon and consequently English names. Thus, the first day of the week is Sunnandaeg with the Saxons; Dies Solis with the Romans. Monday is Monan-daeg with the Saxons; Dies Luna with the Romans. Tuesday is, among the Saxons, Tues-daeg-that is, Tuesco's Dayfrom Tuesco, a mythic person, supposed to have been the first warlike leader of the Teutonic

nations: among the Romans it was Dies Martis,
The fourth
the day of Mars, their god of war.
day of the week was, among the Saxons, Woden's-
daeg, the day of Woden, or Oden, another
mythical being of high warlike reputation among
the northern nations, and the nearest in character
to the Roman god of war. Amongst the Romans,
however, this day was Dies Mercurii, Mercury's
Day. The fifth day of the week, Thors-daeg of
the Saxons, was dedicated to their god Thor,
who, in his supremacy over other gods, and his
attribute of the Thunderer, corresponds very
exactly with Jupiter, whose day this was (Dies
Jovis) among the Romans. Friday, dedicated to
the Romans (Dies Veneris), was
named by the Saxons, in honour of their corre-
sponding deity (Friga), Frigedaeg. The last day
of the week took its Roman name of Dies Saturni,
and its Saxon appellative of Seater-daeg, respect-
ively from deities who approach each other in
character.

Venus among

It may be remarked, that the modern German names of the days of the week correspond toler. ably well with the ancient Saxon: Sonntag, Sunday; Montag, Monday; Dienstag, Tuesday; Mittwoche, mid-week day [this does not correspond, but Godenstag, which is less used, is Woden's day]; Donnerstag, Thursday [this term, meaning the Thunderer's day, obviously corresponds with Thors-daeg]; Freitag, Friday; Samstag or Sonnabend, Saturday [the latter term means eve of Sunday]. The French names of the days of the week, on the other hand, as befits a language so largely framed on a Latin basis, are like those of ancient Rome: Dimanche [the Lord's Day], Lundi, Mardi, Mercredi, Jeudi, Vendredi, Samedi.

With reference to the transference of honour

THE BOOK OF DAYS.