Connecticut western news., 1900-01-11
MARKING TIME.

Year. The following brief account of the way in which our present calendar year has been computed for us may be of especial interest to some of our readers who have been interested in the cantury question. It contains no arguments pro or con, and limited space does not do the subject justice.
 The solar astronomical year is the period of time in which the earth per forms revolution in it's orbit about the sun. passing from one point arJuod to the same point again, and consists of 865 days, hours. AS minutes and 56 seconds. By reason of the fractional excess of the solar year above S65 days it happens that the civil or calendar year cannot always contain the same number of days if the hour of their commencement remain fixed, for the day and the year are considered as com mencing at the same instant, hence our present arrangement of bissextile or leap years.
 In early ages of the world the phases of the moon were marked with attention and the longest period of time reckoned was by the month. This system grew into the lunar year which contained 354 days and of course did not agree with the solar year The mean solar day IS a result of computation aud differs but very slightly from the true solar or sp- parent day.
 The division of the day into 24 parts or hours has prevailed since the remot- est ages, though different nations have not agreed as to the time of its com mencement, though European nations, like the ancient Egyptians, place the commencement of the civil day at mid night.
 The week of seven days has no refer ence to celestial motions and has re- msined uniform from time immemorial, though 1t was not used in the calendar of the ancient Greeks nor in that of the earlier Romans. The ancient Egyptian week commenced with Saturday, but the Jews on their flight from Egypt from hatred of their oppressors-msde Saturday the last day of the week. The month has always retained it's place in the calendar of all nations, but instead of denoting lunar period is usually employed to denote an arbitrary mum. Der of days approaching the twelfth part of @ solar year.
 A study of chronology and history show many attempts of the ancients to get their months and years to agree with the solar periods but without much measure of success. The civil calehdal of all European countries has been Dor rowed from that of the Romans. Romu Jus divided the year into ten months on ly including BOA days. and no one evel has discovered how the remaining days were accounted for. In the reign oi Numa two months were added, January at the beginning, and February at the end of the year, and this arrangement continued until 452 B. O., when the or, der was changed, and February placed after January. The months then con sisted of 29 and 30 days alternately tc correspond to the lunar year of 354 days, but day WAS added to make ar odd number for the sake of luck. Tc make this year correspond to the solal periods Numa ordered an additiona month of twenty-two and twenty three days alternately to be introduced be tween the 23d and 24th of February every second year. The additional month was called Mercedinus.
 In the time of Julius Cesar the calen dar was so defective that the civil year differed from the solar by three months so that the winter months were carried back into the autumn and the autumn back into the summer. Cesar abolished the use of the lunar year and the inter calary months and regulated the civi year entirely by the sun. He fixed the mean length of tho year at 365t dayt and decreed that every fourth year should have 366 days, the other years having S65 each. The year that he made the change was augmented by two extra months between November and December besides the extra 23 day. of the month of Mercedinus, and that was the longest year Rome ever saw containing in all 445 days. This wal called the last yes- of confusion and the Julian era began on the next day. the 1st of January. 45 B, o. and 707 yeart after the foundation of Rome.
 Q Till the fifteenth century the Jew, followed the era of the Seleucidae, and since that time have employed a nun dane era dating from the creation of ths world which they compute took plac, 3760 years before the commencement O the Christian era. The Christian ol vulgar era, called also the era of linear nation is now employed in all Christian countries and to some extent in Essterr nations. Its commencement is the frs of January the 753d year from the foun dstion of Rome and was supposed tC begin with the year of the birth O Christ, though theoIogians and som, chronologists contend that Christ wa born about four years previous to tn, commencement of the era. Christmas the festival of the Christian Church, ob served on the 25th of December in mem ory of the birth of Christ is h, Id by some to commence the era, but it il doubtful if Christ was born in Decem Der as that month is the heighth of tn, rainy season in Judea when neithe flocks nor shepherds could have been a night in the fields of Bethlehem. It i held that in celebrating the festival tn, early Christian Church set upon dat, Of a former festival rather than in tryin, to commemorate the actual anniversary The celebration of Easter-commemora ting the resurrection-is not in moderl times, nor was ever, confined to dat, of the month.
 The Julian calendar was employed b, the Rnnana nntil the lime of Pom