Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1873-07-03

the unknown sea that rolls round all
the world"
Time Around the World.
We have received of late sundry
queries from correspondents relative to
the gain or loss of time in circumnav-
igating the globe. Those who have
not found answers in the columns de-
voted to such purpose will receive a
general response in the following rath-
er amusing discussion recently carried
on between two grave and learned
French savants on the same rather pa
radoxical topic. M. Jules Verne, of
the French Geographical Society, has
written a book entitled a "Tour around
the World in Twenty-four Hours" p
What the nature of the contents of the
volume is, we know not; but at all E.
vents it excited NJ. J. Bertrand, of the
Academy of Sciences, to attempt to
pose NJ. Verne with the following CO.
nundrum: "a person, supposed to be
furnished with the necessary means Of
transportation, leaves Paris at noon on
Thursday; he travels to Brest, thence
to New York, San Francisco, Jeddo,
etc., returning to his starting point af-
ter twenty-four hours, that is, encir-
cling the globe at the rate of 15o of
longitude per hour. Atevery station,
as he passes ON his journey, he asks {:
"What time is t?'' and he is invaria-
bly, answered: "Noon." He then in
quires "what day of the week is it %
At Brest, "Thursday" is the reply, at
New York the same; but on his return,
supposing he passes Paris from the east
and stops at Pontoise, town some 10
miles to the northwest of that city, he
will be answered 'Friday." Where
does the transition happen? Or when,
if our traveller is a good Catholic,
should he consider Fridays abstinence
from meat ro begin? "It is evident" !"
continues the questioner, ''that the
transition must be sudden, and may be
considered to take place at sea or in a
country where the names of weeks
days are unknown but" he continues,
Suppose the parallel at which it hap
pens should fall on continent habit
ed by civilized people speaking the
same language, and that there should
be two neighbors separated, say by a
fence, on this very parallel. Then
would not one say it was Thursday, at
noon, while. at the saitie moment the
other would assert it to be Frsday, at
the like hour ?''
NJ. Verne answers as follows: 1t is
true that, whenever a person makes
the tour of the globe to the east, he
gains day, and similarly when trav-
cling to the west he loses a like period,
that is to say, the twenty-four hours
which the sun in his apparent motion
occupies in describing circle around
the earth. This is so real and we'll rec
ognized that the administration of the
French navy gives a supplementary
days ration to vessels which, leaving
Europe, double the Cape of Good Hope,
while it retains on the contrary SIM
liar provision from ships rounding the
Horn. It is also true that, if paral-
lei existed, such as above described,
across an inhabited region, there would
be complete disagreement between the
people adjacent thereto; but this par
allel does not exist, for Nature has
placed oceans and deserts in our path
where transition is made and day
gained or lost unconsciously. Through
an International convention, the point
for making the days agree has been fix
ed at the meridian of Manila. Cap
tains of vessels, under the same rule,
change the dates of their. log books
when they pass the 18th meridian.
Edgar A. Poe, if we are not mista-
ken, avails himself of this apparent
puzzle, in one of his desultory sketches,
to point the story of an individual
whose would-be father-in-law refuses
him the hand of his adored, with her
concomitant of an agreeably large
dowery, until that time shall happen
when ''two Sundays fall in week" p
The luckless lover in despair goes to
sea, sails round the world, and returns
to renew his suit exactly one year from
his departure. In the course of events
a discussion takes place between him
self and the stern parent relative to
the present day of the week, in which
he insists that it is Monday, and the
old gentleman is equally positive that
it is Sunday. The one produces his
diary, kept since his departure; the
other falls back upon the calendar
Finally it transpires that the traveller
in sailing round the globe to the east
has gained day in his reckoning;
hence both disputants are right, two
Sundays have come together, and the
happy denomen'e'at follows.-Scientifc
american.
B9A ten-year old boy boasting to
schoolmate of his fathers accom-
nlishmants said HMv father can do