The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1896-02-25
NO BIRTHDAY.
Horrible Pate That Must Overtake
Many Inn0cents.
Children Will Have to Walt Eight Years
Before They Can Celebrate.

worse TO be without a country or with
out birthday?
The New York Herald says 1t is
safe to predict that at the end of
this month there will be born in the
city of New York alone no less than
one hundred innocent beings, girls and
boys, qualified in every respect To be
citizens of this great metropolis, of this
dominant empire State and OF the most
magnificent end enlightened countries
known TO the world-these United States
of America will have no birthday
next year, nor in any one of the first
seven years OF their life upon earth. Some
OF them may die before they have reached
the eighth year of their being, and SO
will have gone down to their graves with
out knowing the glory and delight of a
legitimate annual celebration OF their
arrival upon earth. OF the most long lived
OF the others IL is absolutely correct to
say that more than three-quarters of their
lives Will probably be passed without this
benehcent experience.
WHY THE NAME LEAP YEAR.
A certain ingenious antiquarian seeking
explanation for the term OF leap year, re-
ferred IL. after deep thought, TO the blank
which during that year occurs in the
Roman calender, "every day in which is
particular saint, with the single exception
OF February 20. This day is not SO appro-
priated for very obvious reasons. Thus,
the year in which occurred the day which
was passed, or leaped over, without an
anniversary, might have been called a
leap year by the monastic makers OF
calendars.o
One pauses to ask with bated breath,
what are this gentleman's obvious rea-
sons? Does he, in his abject ignorance,
mean 10 tell us that n saint, real godly
personage would refuse to be born on
that hideous date? Does he mean 10 say
that no one who comes into this vale Of
tears on February 20 can ever hope to
W ear a crown in heaven? Or tc be pict-
ured with a gilt nimbus around his head
by the Pre- Raphaelites of the futureY III
so. he falls into grievous error. The
church usually celebrates the death day,
not the birthday, of saint, considering
that his true birthday occurs when he
leaves the sfore described vale and is new
born into heaven.
Does the church then refuse to believe
than 4 man can be born into heaven on
the fateful Goth?
Here again our antiquary is in error.
For IL you refer To any homsn Catholic
calendar, or to so common of hook as
"Chamber's Book of Days." you will find
that the February 20 Is not LETT in the
condition of heather unsanctification,
which our antfquary presumptuously as
serts. On the contrary, ii is dedicated TO
a very important and sanity gentleman,
no less parsonage that st. Oswald, Arch
bishop of York, who died on Feb. %,
992, and was subsequently canoniZeo for
the zeal with which he had assisted st.
Dunstan and Odo in revolutionizing the
Apglo-Saxon Church and substituting the
strict monarchism of the Benedictines for
the old genial married clergy, or, in other
words, reducing the Church of England
TO a complete subjection 10 Rome, May
hap it was for this reason that the Re-
formed Church of England cast him out
from her calendar and left the 29th a
day un hallowed and unanneled.
FACTS AND FIGURES.
But to get back to earth again, it may
be asked, what is our authority for the
confident prediction that hundred or
more innocents will be born to this hide
Gus fate of birthday lessness? Our autho-
rity is in the figures, which, equally with
the great patriot whose birthday we cele-
brate this last week steadily re-
fuse to tell lie The bureau of vital
statistics in New York has furnished us
with a table representing the weekly
number of births for the year ending Feb.
:, 1885, From this table it appears that.
beginning with the noble number Of 115S
in the first week of Feb, 1885, this period
came to a brilliant close with 1920 born
in the week that closed Feb. 1, 1896.
Ii shows also that the largest grand
total of births during the entire twelve
month indicated occurred in the week
ending January 4, 1896, which speaks
volumes for the parturitive powers of
motherhood during the current year of
grace, and promises results that may be
phenomenally in advance OF 1895. Now,
during the period named, in 1895, the
pIah In rcair fr,
that ending May Is, when S3o births were
recorded. The total number of births
throughout the year was 81, 362, which
gives a weekly average of over 1000.
Ii is obvious, therefore, that we are
speaking only within limits when we as
sign the very small number Of 100 births
to the forthcoming 29th OF February.
LEoAL HOLIDAY ON THE 10Th.
Now suppose that one of these inno-
cents should become martyr President
or n second Father OF His Country. 1t
will mitigate the inconvenience of future
generations IL they must celebrate three
holidays in February TO know that the
third, at least, with its attendant discom-
forts for business meii, Will only recur at
quaternary Intervals.
One cannot help thinking that il Wash
ington had teen as wise in the womb as
he was in the cradle (test certain en-
thuslastic biographers) he would have de-
layed his coming for just one week.
Washington, II will he remembered, was
born in 1872. Now 1882 was a leap year.
There crowds upon the mind other
queries suggested by the figures which
the Bureau OF Vital Statistics has SO kindly
furnished, and by other statistics else
where obtainable With an annual increase
of 81, 200 by births alone, In population
of, say, two millions, and still greater in
crease by immigration, native and for
eign, and with a com mparatively small ratio
of decrease by deaths, where will New
York be at the same relative ratios at the
end of a-hundred years? At the end OF two
hundred? Figure IL up for yourself, and
you will be appalled, by the result.
ovERoRowDINo THE WORLD.
Nay, let us make larger and more in
elusive calculation. New York is only a
part of the world. SO long as IL can an
mex larger and larger portions OF the
worlds surface il will be safe. But mean
while that world will also be increasing
in population beyond the possibility OF
annexation. Let us see. II may be said
roughly that out of the 49, $50, 000 square
- a I,n prfa ~ ha % d