Dec. 3. 1853.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



545 



sidered by ancient authors. But this passage 

 from Varro is a new and hitherto unnoticed proof, 

 and certainly it ought to be a most convincing 

 one, because it seems impossible to give to Varro's 

 words a rational meaning without the admission of 

 this hypothesis, while with it everything is clear 

 and consistent. 



The commentators, driven by the necessity I 

 have just pointed out, either to admit the afternoon 

 position of sexta hora, or to abstain from reading 

 it as a space of time, have attempted to force a 

 meaning by reading sexta hora in its other sense, 

 an absolute mathematical point, the punctus ipse of 

 noon. 



In so doing they have not scrupled to libel 

 Varro's common sense ; they represent his idea of 

 the absurd to consist in the embarrassment that 

 would be caused by the birth occurring at the 

 critical moment of change, — split as it were upon 

 the knife-edge of noon ; so that, in the doubt that 

 would arise as to which day it should belong, it 

 must be attributed partly to both I 



This interpretation is so monstrous, and so evi- 

 dently wide of the meaning of the words, that its 

 serious imputation would scarcely be believed, if 

 it were not embalmed in the Delphin edition of 

 Aulus Gellius, where we read the following foot- 

 note referring to the argumentum ad absurdum of 

 Varro : 



" Infirmum omnino argumentum, et quod perinde 

 potest in ipsum Varronem retorqueri. Quid enini ? 

 Si quis apud Romanes Calendis hora vi. noctis fuerit 

 natds, nonne pariter dies ejus natalis videri debebit, et 

 partim Calendarum, et partim ejus diei qui sequetur?" 



It is not worth while to inquire what may have 

 been the precise dilemma contemplated by the 

 writer of this note, since most certainly it is not a 

 reflex of Varro's meaning. The word dimidiatus 

 is completely cushioned, although Gellius himself 

 has a chapter upon it a little farther on in the 

 same volume. 



The anomaly that amused Varro was the ne- 

 cessity of piecing together two halves not be- 

 longing to the same individual day and Avith the 

 hiatus of a night between them ; a necessity that 

 would asstiredly appear most absurd to one who 

 had no other idea of birthday than the twelve 

 consecutive hours of artificial day, which he would 

 call " the natural day." 



This proneness of the Romans to look upon the 

 dies soils as the only effective part of the twenty- 

 four hours, is again apparent in their commence- 

 ment of horary notation at sunrise, six hours later 

 than the actual commencement of the day. And 

 in our own anomalous repetition of twice twelve, 

 we may still trace the remains of the twelve-hour 

 day ; we have changed the Initial point, but we 

 have retained the measure of duration. 



It Is, however, certain that the two methods of 

 reckoning time continued for a long time to exist 



contemporaneously. Hence it became necessary tty 

 distinguish one from the other hy name, and thus- 

 the notation from midnight gave rise, as I have 

 remarked In one of my papers on Chaucer, to the 

 English Idiomatic phrase "of the clock ;" or the 

 reckoning of the clock, commencing at midnight, 

 as distinguished from Roman equinoctial hours, 

 commencing at six o'clock A. m. This was what 

 Ben Jonson was meaning by attainment of ma- 

 jority at six o'cloclt, and not, as Professor De 

 Morgan supposes, " probably a certain sunrise."^ 

 Actual sunrise had certainly nothing to do with 

 the technical commencement of the day In Ben 

 Jonson's time. For convenience sake, six o'clock 

 had long been taken as conventional sunrise all the 

 year round ; and even amongst the Romans them- 

 selves, equinoctial hours were frequently used at 

 all seasons. Actual sunrise, in after times, had 

 only to do with " hours Inequall," which are said 

 to have fallen into disuse, in common life, so early 

 as the fifth or sixth century. 



I trust I may now have shown reasonable 

 grounds for the belief that Ben Jonson may, after 

 all, have had better authority than his license as a 

 dramatic poet, for dating the attainment of ma- 

 jority at six o'clock a.m. ; and that nothing short 

 of contemporary evidence directly contradictory 

 of the custom so circumstantially alluded to by 

 him, ought to be held sufficient to throw discredit 

 upon it. It Is one of the singular coincidences 

 attending the discussion of this matter by Gellius, 

 that, at the conclusion of the chapter I have been 

 expatiating upon, he should cite the authority of 

 Virgil ; observing that the testimony of p)oets ia 

 very valuable upon such subjects, even when- 

 veiled in the obscurity of poetic imagery. 



A.E.B. 



Leeds. 



LORD HALIFAX AND MRS. CATHERINE BARTON. 



(Vol. viil., p. 429.) 



Your correspondent Prof. De Morgan has so 



ingeniously analysed the facts, which he already 

 possesses, bearing on the connexion of Sir Isaac 

 Newton's niece with Lord Halifiix, and her desig- 

 nation in the Biographia Britannica, that I am. 

 tempted to furnish him with some additional evi- 

 dence. This question of Mrs. Catherine BartonV 

 widowhood has often been canvassed by that por- 

 tion of her relatives who do not possess the cus- 

 tody of Sir Isaac Newton's private letters. 



The Montagues had a residence In the village 

 of Bregstock In Northamptonshire, where the 

 Bartons lived. The Bartons were a family of good 

 descent, and had long been lessees of the crowtt 

 with the Montagues for lands near Braystock. 



There were several Colonel Bartons, whose 

 respective ages and relationship can best be ex- 



