his hair cut short up to his ears, and hands coloured; his majesty refusing to have any gloves, when Father Hodlestone offered him some, as also to change his stick."

30, 31. WHIT-MONDAY and WHIT-TUESDAY. These days are observed as festivals, for the same reason as the Monday and Tuesday in Easter. Their religious character, however, is almost obsolete, and they are now kept as holidays, in which the lower classes still pursue their favourite diversions.

The Whitsun ales at this time of the year (observes Mr. Douce) are conducted in the following manner : Two persons are chosen, previously to the meeting, to be lord and lady of the ale, who dress as suitably as they can to the characters they assume. Α large empty barn, or some such building, is provided for the lord's hall, and fitted up with seats to accommodate the company. Here they assemble to dance and regale in the best manner their circumstances and place will afford; and each young fellow treats his lady with a ribbon or favour. The lord and lady honour the ball with their presence, attended by the steward, sword-bearer, purse-bearer, and macebearer, with their several badges or ensigns of office. They have likewise a train-bearer or page, and a fool or jester, drest in a party-coloured jacket, whose ribaldry and gesticulation contribute not a little to the entertainment of some part of the company. The lord's music, consisting of a pipe and tabor, is employed to conduct the dance. Some people think this custom is a commemoration of the antient Drink-lean, a day of festivity formerly observed by the tenants and vassals of the lord of the fee within his manor, the memory of which, on account of the jollity of those meetings, the people have thus preserved ever since. The glossaries inform us, that this Drink-lean was a contribution of tenants towards a potation or Ale, provided to entertain the lord or his steward.'

At Kidlington, in Oxfordshire, the custom is, that, on Monday after Whitsun week, there is a fat live lamb provided; and the maids of the town, having their thumbs tied behind them, run after it; and she that with her mouth takes and holds the lamb, is declared Lady of the Lamb; which being dressed, with the skin hanging on, is carried on a long pole before the lady and her companions to the green, attended with music, and a Morisco dance of men and another of women, where the rest of the day is spent in dancing, mirth, and merry glee. The next day the lamb is part baked, boiled, and roast, for the Lady's Feast, where she sits majestically at the upper end of the table, and her companions with her, with music and other attendants, which ends the solemnity.-(Blount's Fragmenta Antiq., by Beckwith, p. 281.)

In Poor Robin's Almanack for 1676, stool-ball and barley-break are spoken of as Whitsun sports. In the Álmanack for the following year, in June, opposite Whitsunday and Holidays, we read :

At Islington

A fair they hold, Where cakes and ale

Are to be sold.

At Highgate and
At Holloway,

The like is kept

Here every day.

At Totnam Court
And Kentish Town,
And all those places
Up and down.

Astronomical Occurrences.

In our present calendars, the days of the week are. distinguished by the first seven letters of the alphabet, A, B, C, D, E, F, G. The letter A is always. put for the first day of the year; B, for the second; C, for the third; and so on in succession to the seventh. Should the 1st of January fall on a Sunday, the dominical or Sunday letter for that year will be A, the Monday letter B, and so for the rest throughout the year. If the year contained 364 days, making an exact number of weeks, it is obvious that A would, for ever, have been the dominical letter. The year, however, containing one day more, it follows that the

dominical letter of the succeeding year will be G. For as there are 365 days in a year, Sunday being the first day of the year, it will also be the last, and the first Sunday in the following year will fall on the seventh day, which will be marked G. Thus the Sunday letters go back from A to G; from G to F; from F to E, and so on. If every year were to consist of 365 days, the process would be regular, and a cycle of seven years would suffice to restore the same letters to the same days as before; but the intercalation of a day eyery fourth year occasions a variety. The bissextile or leap year, containing 366 days, will throw the Sunday letter back two letters; so that in the year 1815 the Sunday letter will be A, but in 1816, that being leap year, it will be G till the end of February, and then it will be F to the end of the year. Hence

twenty-eight years must elapse before a complete revolution can take place in the dominical letter; and a table constructed to show the dominical letters for any given years, of one of these cycles, will answer for the corresponding years in every successive cycle.

These observations are introduced as preliminary to the finding Easter Sunday, which is not only one of the most considerable festivals in the Christian calendar, but that which regulates and determines the time of all other moveable feasts. The rule for the celebration of Easter, fixed by the Council of Nice, is that it be held on the Sunday which falls next after the full Moon following the 21st of March, that is the Sunday which falls next after the first full Moon after the vernal equinox. The reason of this decree was, that Christians might avoid celebrating their Easter at the same time that the Jews celebrate their Passover, which was always held the very day of the full Moon.

The only difficulty, therefore, is to find the day when the paschal full Moon occurs. The rules for finding

this, and also the dominical letter, we might readily insert; but as they require some calculation, most of our readers will probably prefer a table that renders the finding of Easter Sunday very easy, from the present period to the year 1900.

Epacts. Paschal full Moons. Epacts.

13th April -
2d April
12th March

Paschal full Moons.

4th April 24th March

X.

C

xi.

-

F

xxii.

12th April

1st April

xiv. 30th March

- E

xxiii.

21st March

C

We have already shown that the epact is found by means of the golden number; thus, for the year 1814,

To find the dominical letter for any year.-Rule: Divide the hundreds of the given year by 4, and subtract twice the remainder from 6; then the sum of this last remainder, the odd years, and their fourth, divided by 7, will leave a remainder which, being deducted from 7, shows the index of the dominical letter. Thus, for the year 1814,

Two, then, is the index of the dominical letter; and as 1 is the index of A, 2 must be the index of B, which is the dominical letter for the year 1814.

Now to find Easter with these data and the foregoing table: we have the epact 9, which corresponds with the 4th of April, whose weekly letter is c, but the Sunday letter of 1814 is B; therefore the first Sunday B, after the 4th of April c, will be on the 10th of April, which is Easter Sunday.

Having obtained Easter-day, the other feasts are easily calculated, thus:

Epiphany, or Twelfth-day, is always on the 6th of January. Septuagesima Sunday is 9 weeks before Easter.

Shrove Sunday, 7 weeks before Easter.

Ash Wednesday, 3 days after Shrove Sunday.

Easter term begins a fortnight after the Wednesday in Easterweek.

Rogation Sunday is 6 weeks after Easter.

Ascension-day is 39 days after Easter Sunday.
Whitsunday is 7 weeks after Easter-day.

Trinity Sunday is the next after Whitsunday.

Trinity term begins the Friday after Trinity Sunday, and ends on the Wednesday fortnight after.

The beginning and end of Hilary and Michaelmas terms are fixed.

Advent is always the Sunday nearest the 30th of November, whether before or after; and the Sundays after Trinity, marked in the calendar, are those between Trinity Sunday and Advent Sunday.

The rising and setting of the Sun for certain days in the month of May will be as follow:

1st, Sun rises 37 m. past 4. Sun sets 23 m. past 7

Sunday,
Wednesday, 11th,
Saturday, 21st,

The Sun enters the sign Gemini at 36 m. past 6 in the afternoon of the 21st. Saturn is stationary on the 11th. Mars eclipses the star marked 132 8, passing nearly over the centre; and again, on the 27th, it eclipses & п 54' north of the centre.

Equation of Time. [See January.] The following table will show what is to be subtracted from the apparent time as marked on the dial to obtain equal or true time for each fifth day during the month of May: