153 



LEAGUE. 



LEAP-YEAR. 



154 



of the sea; this alone frequently acquaints a mariner with his ship's 



The heaving of the lead forms one of the most interesting, as it is 

 often one of the most intensely exciting, of all nautical operations, and 

 it is so important that the Board of Trade have attributed the loss of 

 a large amount of life and property to a neglect of it. It has been the 

 theme of heart-stirring song and the plaintive voice of the leadsman 

 calling the depths with studied professional tone and precision, as 'he 

 feels beneath him the distance of the hidden danger, still enchants the 

 ear of the evening wanderer upon coasts along which the sailor stems 

 his way. To those even who are ignorant of the nature of the opera- 

 tion of sounding, the peculiar harmony of the leadsman's song acts 

 like a momentary spell upon the sense, and arrests the step until the 

 last note expires, and the evening or night resumes its stillness. 



LEAGUE, LEUCA, LEUGA, LEUVA, LEWEKE, &c., an. 

 itinerary measure, which in modern English always means the twen- 

 tieth part of a degree of latitude, or three of| what are called 

 geographical miles, each of which is the sixtieth part of a degree. 

 The variation of the degrees of latitude is not sufficient to make this 

 measure sensibly incorrect for nautical purposes ; and the league of 

 our sailors may be described and easily remembered as 3'456 statute 

 miles of 1760 yards each. The same marine league is used by the 

 French and other nations; besides which, the French have among 

 then- itinerary land measures two distinct leagues (or lieuei, in some of 

 the pioviuces liyites), the first of 2000 toises, or 2'42 English statute 

 miles, which is the legal posting measure ; the second of 25 to the 

 degree, or 277 English miles. These are selected from among the 

 French measures for their celebrity, and not as being the only ones ; 

 for before the Revolution there was no legal itinerary measure, and the 

 length of the league varied from province to province. (Paucton.) 



The leaf a of the ancient English law writers is necessary to be deter- 

 mined before the rights given by many charters can be denned ; but 

 unfortunately the length of this measure is enveloped in utter confusion. 

 The modern lawyers, we believe, evade the question by setting it down 

 as a mile; thus the legal minimum distance between two markets, 

 which was certainly 7 leuce, is now called 7 miles. We shall, in the 

 present article, collect a few testimonies on the length of the leuca, and 

 must leave the reader to form the best opinion which he can upon the 

 varying presumptions which they afford. 



By citations in Ducange, Paucton, &c., it appears that Hesychius 

 distinctly describes the \e\rfq,* and Jerome, Jornaudes, &c., the leuca 

 (stated by Camden to be derived from the Celtic Itadi, a stone) as a 

 Gaulish measure ; and the original Gallic league was set down by the 

 Romans as a mile and a half of their own measure, which was in all 

 probability a rough estimation, first used in the Itinerary of Antoninus. 

 In that work the distances from place to place in Gaul are frequently 

 given in leagues (always in whole numbers), which are in every instance 

 reduced to Roman miles at the rate of a mile and a half to each league. 

 (.See also Amm. M.ucrll., xvi., c. 12.) Hence, taking the Roman foot 

 at 11*62 English inches (which is a mean between the most trust- 

 worthy measures) and the pace of 5 feet at 58*1 inches, the Roman 

 mile of luOO paces is 1614 English yards, and the leuca was therefore 

 2421 yards, subject to the error of the Roman estimation; or 1'376 

 modern English miles, with the same reservation. 



This leuca in all probability was brought by the Normans into 

 England. It is true that the Saxon charters of Ingulphus describe 

 distances in leuca; ; but the genuineness of these charters is now con- 

 sidered more than questionable, and perhaps this very circumstance is 

 a presumption against them. 



The evidence against the genuineness of the history of Ingulphus, 

 when all put together, looks very strong. (Wright, ' Biog. Brit. Lit.,' 

 Anglo-Norman period, p. 28.) There is nothing to set against it except 

 our knowledge that the reaction against a work which has once been 

 received, when suspicion of forgery arises, is strong and even bitter : a 

 I'd conclusion may possibly be arrived at in time. It must be 

 remembered, also, that the same research which has thrown doubt 

 upon Ingulphus has detected much tendency to Normanism in England 

 even before the invasion by William : how much, is perhaps hardly 

 known. It may therefore possibly be that the leuca was to some 

 extent used in Saxon England. 



The leuca noon began to vary in sine. Ducange cites an old 



uietrologist who speaks of two leuca;, the one legal, of 3000 paces, the 



other common, varying much in different countries. In the confusion 



incident to our subject, it will be worth while to remember that it was 



not uncommon, when a measure was found too short for convenience, 



to double it without altering its name : thus among the list of old 



1 540) given by John Dee, is found the penny nf two pence. The 



registers of Battle Abbey (Sir H. Ellis) and the ' Monasticon Angli- 



i ' (Ducange) describe the leuca as containing 12 quarantenaj, or 



:gn. Now the furlong (forty-long) is always 40 perches, and the 



perch, though varying much, yet was settled very early at 164 fect - 



This give* a modern statute mile and a half to the leuca ; so that a 



certain set of old authorities countenance the notion that the leuca was 



in their time very little more than that of the Gauls. It is not worth 



The reading in Hcychlu in, \uf,, pir/nt n >>*<ixr. We do not know 

 who made the correction rA*r<>, but this word or r*ti,r<ut > probably the 

 right reading. 



while to take into account any possible variations of the foot, since all 

 the information we can obtain is too rough even to make the whole 

 difference between the Roman and modern English foot of conse- 

 quence. 



The earlier statutes do not define the itinerary measures ; confining 

 themselves entirely to those by which land and goods were bought and 

 sold. And the itinerary measures seem to have been on the increase, 

 perhaps for the following reason : the jurisdiction of towns, monas- 

 teries, &c., was usually defined as extending a leuca or a given number 

 of leuctc in every direction from their precincts, so that it became the 

 interest of these powerful bodies to make the leuca as long as possible. 

 The old French term ban-lieuc, banni-leuca, or league of the edict or 

 regulation, refers to the space over which jurisdiction was granted. 

 Ingulphus, or his personator (for such a fact the two are almost 

 equally good authorities), perhaps lets us a little into the secret 

 when, speaking of his own monastery, he says, " Prudeutissimi meta- 

 tores, contra malitiam emulorum nostrorum piissime providentes, 

 potius plus quam minus ponere voluerunt." The same Ingulphus 

 informs us that in his time the usual league was of 2000 paces, or 

 l'S35 modern English miles, if the Roman pace be meant : but he adds 

 that the English, adopting a Norman word to their own measure, 

 frequently spoke of leucao when they meant miles. But it may be 

 questioned whether the mile and the leuca ever became interchangeable 

 words in writings or charters, at least in England : in several Conti- 

 nental countries the term mile never became vernacular, and miliarc 

 is therefore translated by league. 



There is sufficient evidence to show that, whatever the mile of a 

 later date may have been, the leuca was generally two miles, though, 

 instances occur hi which it is still described as 1500 paces. The fol- 

 lowing are extracts with which we have been favoured from manu- 

 scripts in the British Museum. In the registers of the monastery of 

 Canterbury (of the 14th century) we have the following : "Mensura 

 uuius pollicis incipit ex transverse radicum unguiuum pollicis. Tres 

 pollices imam palmam faciunt : quatuor palmi faciunt unum pedem. 

 Pes et dimidiuui faciunt cubitum parvum : Sex parvi cubiti faciuut 

 cubitum magnum. Quinque pedes faciuut passuin unum. Centum 

 viginti quinque passus faciunt stadium unum. Ucto stadia faciuut 

 unum miliare. Duo miliaria faciuut unani leucam." This gives a 

 leuca of 10,000 feet. Again, in the same manuscript : " Memorandum 

 quod virga communis coutinet xvi. pedes et dimid. videlicet quinque 

 ulnic et dimid. secundum standardum Regis. Idem xl. virgat. conti- 

 nent i. quarantenam. Item vii. quarantente et dimid. iii. virgat. et ii. 

 palm, continent unum rniliar. Item duo miliar. continent i. leucam." 

 This gives a leuca of the same length. In a manuscript supposed to be 

 of the tune of Edward IV. we find " v. fote make a pase, and ther go 

 viii. forelongs to a mile in Yugland, and ii. ynglysch myle make a 

 ffrenshe leweke." 



Bractou (Henry III.) and Fleta (Edward I. ?) both assert (see the 

 citations ill Cowell, Comyns's ' Digest,' &c.) (i leagues and half a league 

 and the third part of a half (or 63 leagues) as being the distance between 

 two markets which do not injure each other ; because 20 niiles is a 

 reasonable day's journey : now (both of them say) if the ditto., or day's 

 work, be divided into three parts, the first is for going to the market, 

 the second for business, and the third for returning. This appears to 

 mean that no market should be established within a third of a day's 

 journey of any one who is already within a third of a day's journey of 

 the established market, so as to give him the option of going to either ; 

 that is, the two markets must be at least of 20 miles apart, which 

 being further described as 6ij leagues, shows that the leuca is 2 miles. 

 This quotation is important, as establishing the meaning which the 

 old law writers attached to the word. 



It may then, we think, be confidently asserted, that the league, 

 which began as a mile and a half (Roman), soon became lengthened, 

 until it remained fixed at two of the miles of the day. It appears, 

 also, that this length of 2 miles was a settled league at so early a 

 period, that it is the measure of our oldest law writers, and of most of 

 the oldest charters. It depends, therefore, upon the mile of the 13th 

 and 1 4th centuries ; and we must refer to the article MILE for the dis- 

 cussion of its absolute length. In order that matters of computation 

 very nearly related may not be separated, we refer to that article some 

 independent evidence on the leugth of the league, which makes no 

 mention of the mile. We shall finish this article by stating our con- 

 viction that the length of the league or leuca was, in the time of the 

 old law writers, very near, one way or the other, to two modern statute 

 miles and nine-tenths of a mile : the old mile being to the modern 

 statute mile in the proportion of 145 to 100. 



LEAP YEAR, the name given to every fourth year of the Julian 

 calendar, in which one additional day (a twenty-ninth day of February) 

 is reckoned. This correction constitutes the distinction of the Julian 

 calendar : the necessity for the Gregorian correction arises from the 

 years being made a very little too long, one with another, by making 

 them consist of 365J days each, as is done when a day is added to each 

 fourth year. The Gregorian correction is made by omitting three leap 

 years in four centuries, and it is settled that the common years, which 

 would otherwise be leap years, shall be those which terminate centuries 

 in which the first pair of figures is not divisible by four. Thus the 

 years 1800 and 1900 are not leap years, but 2000 is leap year ; 2100, 

 2200, 2300 are not leap years, but 2400 is leap year. [KALENDAK.] 



