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which one arrow is taken, and which she points towards herself, implying the suicidal melancholy of November. She is arranged in black, and a veil is thrown across her temples marked .

In due course succeeds a Vestal maid leading a Goat to the altar by its horns. She is clad in a fiery robe; and on the head of the Goat are Holly and Ivy berries. A torch in one of the hands of the females indicates the necessity of candle light in December, or else is an emblem of Vesta, to whose care this month is confided by Antiquity; while a blazing star on her forehead evidently means the star of Bethlehem which pointed out the place of the Nativity. She bore the ensign W.

A cold and shivering figure follows wrapped in a velvet pelisse and fur bonnet. An urn under her arm is pouring water, which, freezing before her feet, she proceeds on skates, and, cutting figures on the ice, leaves on her footsteps the mark ****.

The pure and spotless form of a virgin then follows, but she seems sickly with fever, and is clad in white, with a wreath of snowdrops. Some of the water from the urn of the preceding seems to deluge her march which is impeded by fishes. She holds a candle in her hand, evidently signifying the feast of the Purification, and it is marked with the sign X. The four Seasons have often been represented by figures, of which we may take an instance in the description Ovid has given us of the Temple of the Sun in the second book of the Metamorphoses.

The Hours are usually drawn with light wings to indicate their flight. They pass in pageant rows, but do not return in a ring like the seasons and months. Besides these, the fancy of the mythologist dressed up Day, Night, Morning, Evening, and various physical powers metaphorically, as images in the human or the angelic form, as Flora, Fauna, Pomona, and the whole catalogue of gods and goddesses, to enumerate all which would exceed the limits of our work; we shall therefore return to the divisions of Time, of which the following popular account will be acceptable to most readers :

The parts of time are Seconds, Minutes, Hours, Days, Months, Years, Cycles, Ages, and Periods.

The original standard, or integral measure of Time, is a year, which is determined by the revolution of some celestial body in its orbit, viz. the Sun or Moon.

The time measured by the Sun's revolution in the ecliptic, from any equinox or solstice to the same again, is called the

Solar or Tropical Year, which contains 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 57 seconds; and is the only proper or natural year, because it always keeps the same seasons to the same months.

The quantity of time, measured by the Sun's revolution as from any fixed star to the same star again, is called the Sidereal Year; which contains 365 days, 6 hours, 9 minutes, 141 seconds; and is 20 minutes, 174 seconds, longer than the true Solar year.

The time measured by twelve revolutions of the Moon, from the Sun to the Sun again, is called the Lunar Year; it contains 354 days, 8 hours, 48 minutes, 36 seconds; and is therefore 10 days, 21 hours, 0 minutes, 21 seconds, shorter than the Solar Year. This is the foundation of the Epact.

The Civil Year is that which is in common use among the different nations of the world; of which, some reckon by the Lunar, but most by the Solar. The Civil Solar Year contains 365 days, for three years running, which are called Common Years; and then comes in what is called the Bissextile or Leap Year, which contains 366 days. This is also called the Julian Year on account of Julius Caesar, who appointed the intercalary day every fourth year, thinking thereby to make the Civil and Solar Year keep pace together. And this day, being added to the 23d of February, which in the Roman Calendar was the sixth of the Calends of March, that sixth day was twice reckoned, or the 23d and 24th were reckoned as one day, and was called Bis sextus dies, and thence came the name Bissextile for that year. But in our common Almanacks this day is added at the end of February.

The Lunar Month is the time in which the Moon runs through the Zodiac, and is either periodical or synodical. The Periodical Month is the time spent by the Moon in making one complete revolution from any point of the Zodiac to the same again, which is 27d 7h 43m. The Synodical Month, called a Lunation, is the time contained between the Moon's parting with the Sun at a conjunction, and returning to him again, which is 29d 12h 44m. The Civil Months are those which are framed for the uses of civil life, and are different as to their names, number of days, and times of beginning, in several different countries. The first month of the Jewish year fell according to the Moon in our August and September, Old Style; the second in September and October, and so on. The first month of the Aegyptian year began on the 29th of our August. The first month of the Arabic and Turkish year began the 16th of July. The first month of the Grecian year fell according to the Moon in June and

July, the second in July and August, and so on, as in the following Table.

A month is divided into four parts called Weeks, and a Week into seven parts called Days; so that in a Julian year there are 13 such months, or 52 weeks, and one day over. The Gentiles gave the names of the Sun, Moon, and Planets to the days of the week. To the first, the name of the Sun n; to the second of the Moon; to the third of Mars; to the fourth of Mercury; to the fifth of Jupiter; to the sixth of Venus; and to the seventh of Saturn.

The following are the different Calendars used by different

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In the Embolimic year after Adar they added a month called Veadar

of 30 days.

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The Arabians add 11 days at the end of every year, which keep the same months to the same seasons.

A Day is either Natural or Artificial. The Natural Day contains 24 hours; the Artificial the time from sunrise to sunset. The Natural Day is either Astronomical or Civil. The Astronomical Day begins at noon, because the increase and decrease of days terminated by the horizon are very unequal among themselves; which inequality is likewise augmented by the inconstancy of the horizontal refractions, and therefore the Astronomer takes the meridian for the limit of diurnal revolutions; reckoning noon, that is, the instant when the Sun's centre is on the meridian, for the

beginning of the day. The British, French, Dutch, Germans, Spaniards, Portuguese, and Egyptians, begin the Civil Day at midnight: the ancient Greeks, Jews, Bohemians, Silesians, with the modern Italians and Chinese, begin it at sunsetting: and the ancient Babylonians, Persians, Syrians, with the modern Greeks, at sunrise.

An Hour is a certain determinate part of the day, and is either equal or unequal. An equal Hour is the twenty fourth part of a mean natural day, as shown by well regulated clocks and watches; but these Hours are not quite equal as measured by the returns of the Sun to the meridian, because of the obliquity of the ecliptic and Sun's unequal motion in it. Unequal Hours are those by which the Artificial Day is divided into twelve parts, and the night into as many.

An Hour is divided into 60 equal parts called Minutes, a Minute into 60 equal parts called Seconds, and these again into 60 equal parts called Thirds.

Thus do we divide Time, nor take any thought of it but by its loss, manifested by the passing phenomena. For, as Ovid makes Pythagoras say :

Ipsa quoque assiduo labuntur tempora motu,

Non secus ac flumen, neque enim consistere flumen,
Nec levis hora potest: sed ut unda impellitur undâ,
Urgeturque prior venienti, urgetque priorem,

Tempora sic fugiunt pariter, paritérque sequuntur:

Et nova sunt semper, nam quod fuit antè, relictum est:
Fitque, quod haud fuerat: momentaque cuncta novantur.

An account of the French Revolutionary Calendar, and of several others, will be found under the 22d of September of this work.

September 14. Exaltatio S. Crucis. St. Catharine of Genoa Widow. St. Cormac Bishop and King in Ireland. Holy Rood Day.

Equiria-Rom. Cal.

In some editions of the Calendar there is a Trial of Horses mentioned today, in others it is omitted.

The festival celebrated today is that of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross found by St. Helena, of which we have given an account on the 3d of May. Butler tells us that the miraculous vision of the cross presented to Constantine, and the invocation of that sacred wood by St. Helena, gave occasion to this festival, originally celebrated, by the Title and Exaltation of the Holy Cross, on the 14th of September, both by

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