Without disputing the claim of Mars to stand godfather to this month, or of the Romans, if they liked it, to be his children, there are good astronomical reasons for March being the commencement of the year, while January would seem to have been chosen only from caprice. So thought our ancestors, as well as the Romans, and so too thought the Israelites in obedience to the divine command,* which enjoined that this should be the commencement of their sacred year, as their civil year began in September. The change with us is comparatively speaking of recent date, for prior to the September of 1752, our Civil or Legal Year began on the Day of the Annunciation, i.e. on the 25th of March. Now this was coming much nearer to astronomical truth; but unfortunately the so-called Historical year had for a long time begun on the Day of the Circumcision, i.e., the 1st of January; and to avoid the confusion arising between the two, it was enacted that both should date from the same period. The change, no doubt, removed a cause of some confusion in the calendar, but it was at the expense of much absurdity.t

* "And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying; This month shall be unto you the beginning of months, it shall be the first month of the year to you."xodus, chap. xii. v. 1 and 2.

It is curious to see how closely the Passover of the Jews agrees with the time when the sun crosses or passes over the equator, an event that could hardly have failed to be celebrated with appropriate rites and ceremonies amongst a people so devoted to astronomy as the Egyptians, who had educated Moses.

+ The confusion is indeed manifest, almost too much so to need being pointed out. For example; in describing the year between the 1st of January and the 25th of March, civilians called each day within that period one year earlier than historians; while

the former wrote-January 7th, 1658.

the latter wrote-January 7th, 1659.

though both described the 25th of the following March, and all the

Independent of all other considerations, spring appears to be the natural beginning of the year, as winter is the fitting close of it.*

This change of season is seen more or less distinctly

ensuing months, as being in the year 1659. To prevent the mistakes incident to so complex an arrangement, the doubtful part of each year was usually written in accordance with both modes, by placing two figures at the end; the upper being the Civil, or Legal year,— and the lower, the Historical; thus:

Hence, whenever the year is so written, the lower figure always indicates the year now used in our calendar.

While I am upon this subject, the following quotation from Sir H. Nicolas's Notitia Historica will not be altogether out of place in regard to that alteration in the calendar which forms what is usually called the Old and New Style, premising only that it commenced on the 2nd of September, 1752, on which day the Old Style ceased, and the next day, instead of being called the 3rd, became the 14th of September. The cause of the change is thus explained-" The calendar was farther improved by Julius Cæsar, who, finding that the sun performed his course in 365 days nearly, gave 365 days to each three years, but to every fourth year 366 days, adding a day before the 6th of the Calends of February, which was then reckoned twice; and hence from his sextus we have the term, Bissextile or Leap year. But the astronomers concerned in reforming the calendar under Pope Gregory XIII., observing that in four years the Bissextile added 44 minutes more than the real course of the sun, and finding that in 133 years this would cause a difference of a day, directed that in the course of every 400 years there should be three Sextiles retrenched, the years, expressing the centuries, not being leap-years unless divisible by 4. Thus, 1600 and 2000 are bissextile; but 1700, 1800, and 1900 are not. This improvement was adopted in England in 1752 in pursuance of an act of Parliament, in which it was ordered that the day next following the 2nd of September should be accounted the 14th, the omission of the intermediate days causing the difference between the Old Style and the New. By the same act the commencement of the Civil year was changed from the 25th of March to the 1st of January."

*It is true that the real, or astronomical, spring does not com

marked, according to the temperature, by the whole. of the animal creation. Bats rouse up from their winter sleep; the wood-cock, the field-fare, and the other birds, that had hybernated with us on account of our milder climate, now return to the more northern regions; the rooks are all in motion, building or repairing their nests; the ring-dove coos, the pheasant crows, the throstle sings on the top of some as yet leafless tree, and the bee is on the wing. In the waters and on the earth the busy stir of life is no less visible; the little smelts or sparlings run up the rivers to spawn, and the young lambs make their first appearance in the meadows. In addition to the flowers of the preceding month, we have now the crown imperial, the dog's-tooth violet, narcissus, hyacinth, fritillaries, scarlet ranunculus, pile-wort, tulip, great snow-drop, and violet perfuming the forest-air with its fragrance.

St. David's Day opens the month, taking its appellation from the saint of that name, who flourished in the fifth and sixth ages of the Christian era, and died, it is said, at the age of a hundred and forty years.* Perhaps this longevity ought to be set down amidst the other miracles recorded of St. David.

The custom of wearing the leek upon this day, has been variously accounted for. In the Festa AngloRomanat we are told "that the Britons on this day, constantly wear a leak in memory of a notable and famous victory obtained by them over the Saxons, they during the battle having leeks in their hats for their military colours and distinction of themselves, by per

mence till about the 20th or 21st, but so slight a difference can not affect the question; spring in the vulgar reckoning begins with the month.

*

Vide Pitt De Illustribus Angliæ Scriptoribus. † 12mo. London, 1678, p. 29.

suasion of Saint David."*

Other accounts add that they were fighting under their King Cadwallo, near a field in which that vegetable was growing, at Hethfield, or Hatfield, Chase, in Yorkshire, A. D. 633.† King James informs us that the "Welshmen in commemoration of the great fight by the Black Prince of Wales do wear leeks as their chosen ensigns." Owen § flatly disowns the saint, imagining that the custom arose from the Cymhortha, a neighbourly aid of various kinds afforded by the farmers to any one of their class, who was not able to help himself. The manner of it in some districts was thus; at an appointed time they all met to assist him in ploughing, or in whatever other agricultural service their help was needed; on which occasion they each brought with them a portion of leeks to be used in making a general mess of pottage. But not one of these accounts appears to me more satisfactory than the other, and, though it might be difficult to disprove them, it is no less difficult to believe them. There seems, however, to be a glimpse of truth dawning upon us from another quarter. The onion was sacred amongst the Egyptians ;||

* Hone quotes the same account from Brady's Clavis Calendaria, and is exceedingly wrath with his author for not telling where he found his information. A better proof of the careless way, in which Hone got up his book, and the very small stock of information he brought to his task, could hardly be desired. In Brand's Popular Antiquities, a work familiar to every tyro, there is given under the head of St. David's this identical version of the story, with a reference to the Festa, above quoted.

+ Britannia Sancta, vol. ii. p. 163. Lewis' History of Britain, p. 215 et seq. Geoffrey of Monmouth, (Eng. Trans.) Book xii. chap. 8 & 9; Carte's Hist. of England, vol. i. p. 228.

Royal Apothegms. 12mc. London, 1658.

§ Cambrian Biography, 8vo. London, 1803, p. 86.'

"Allium cepasque," says Pliny, "inter Deos in jurejurando habet Egyptus." The Egyptian in swearing holds the leek and onion amongst the Gods. Nat. Hist. Lib. 19-32. Juvenal also,

and, however we may account for it, there is scarcely a rite or ceremony amongst any people without a precedent in one of earlier date. Keeping this fact steadily in view, it would seem probable that the leek, like the misletoe among the Druids, or the bean amongst the Pythagoreans, had at one time a mystic and religious meaning, and that the custom has survived although its origin has been forgotten.

The next day of note is St. Patrick's Day, which falls upon the seventeenth. Though he is held by the Irish to be their patron saint he was either a Scot or a Welshman. Butler says he was born, according to his own confession,* "in a village called Bonaven Tabernia, which seems to be the town of Killpatrick, on the mouth of the river Clyd in Scotland, between Dumbriton and Glas

Sat. xv. when holding up the Egyptian superstitions to contempt says,

"Porrum et cæpe nefas violare et frangere morsu.

O sanctas gentes, quibus hæc nascuntur in hortis
Numina!"

Thus rendered by Gifford;

"'Tis dangerous here

To violate an onion or to stain

The sanctity of leeks with tooth profane.

O holy nation! sacrosanct abodes!
Where every garden propagates its Gods."

The same thing is mentioned by Prudentius;

"Appone porris religiosas arulas;

Venerare acerbum cæpe, mordax allium."
Περιετεφανων, Hymn x. v. 258.

In plain English "Raise sacred altars to the leek; worship the sharp onion, the biting garlic.”

* Butler's Lives of the Fathers, &c. vol. ix. p. 177. edit. Dublin, 1789. Dumbriton, as Butler has it, or Dumbritoun, as it is spelt in the old maps, is the antiquated mode of writing Dumbarton.