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46
CHRONOLOGIES AND CALENDARS.

130 lines, one hundred dates in duplicate have to be inserted; and seeing that a double number of brackets are necessarily used, the extra expenses of printing must be considerable. And to think that one touch of the new style, imperially allowed, could soon make the whole of Christendom chronologically akin! See section 27 supra on Russia's intention of adopting the N.S.

65. Solar Cycle.[1]—The first year of the first cycle hereof corresponds with 9 B.C. on the Julian Calendar; it means a period of twenty-eight years, at the expiry whereof the days of a month fit once again into the same calends, nones, and ides, or week-days, according to the century in question, as at the first day of the cycle. Thus the new years of 1866 and 1894 (being twenty-eight years apart) fell both on a Monday.

66. Sunday or Dominical Letter, is one of seven letters—A to G inclusive—used in almanacs to denote the Sunday; dies dominica, the Lord's day of later Latinists. In leap years, January and February have one letter, and March to December a new one; otherwise one letter runs for one twelvemonth, and the succession of the letters is in backward order. Thus, 1894 had G, and 1895 had F. The moveable feasts of the Church are found (not fixed) by referring to the Sunday letter and relative tables, includ- the golden number which shows the year of the Metonic or lunar cycle.[2]

67. U.S.A. Reckoning.—Before the 1st of January, 1752, the colonies in America having been British possessions, the calendar of the old country was circulated; and, after the date in question, the New 'Style' prevailed in

  1. Or the cycle of the sun.
  2. See section 57 supra.