MONTH 



3931 



MONTMAGNY 



Commerce and Industry. Montgomery lies 

 in the famous "Black Belt," a band of rich, 

 dark soil, which produces an abundance of cot- 

 ton, grain, fruit, vegetables, timber and live 

 stock. The city is the great central market for 

 this region, and a foremost trucking center for 

 the supply of vegetables to Northern markets. 

 It is one of the chief cotton-shipping cities of 

 the South. Coal and iron-ore are found in the 

 vicinity. In the list of industrial plants cotton 

 mills, cottonseed oil mills and fertilizer plants 

 are most important. There are over fifty 

 wholesale houses and more than 100 manufac- 

 turing plants, besides railroad repair shops. 



History. Andrew Dexter was the founder of 

 the city. It was the site of the legendary In- 

 dian village called Ecunchatty, and Dexter 

 named it New Philadelphia. In 1819 it was 

 consolidated with East Alabama Town as 

 Montgomery, named in honor of General Rich- 

 ard C. Montgomery, of Revolutionary War 

 fame. It was incorporated in 1837 and sup- 

 planted Tuscaloosa as the state capital in 1847. 

 In 1849 the Capitol was destroyed by fire and 

 was replaced by the present one in 1851. The 

 city's interests and large colored population 

 made it the focus of the secession movement. 

 It became the first capital of the Southern Con- 

 federacy, and for this reason was called The 

 Cradle oj the Confederacy; here Jefferson 

 Davis was inaugurated as President. In 1910 

 the city adopted the commission form of gov- 

 ernment. B.K. 



MONTH, munth, a period of time measured 

 by the motion of the moon. The word origi- 

 nally meant the time during which the moon 

 makes a complete revolution, but as that might 

 be a revolution with reference to one of several 

 heavenly bodies, special names are applied to 

 the different periods. Thus, the revolution of 

 the moon from perigee to perigee (see PERIGEE) 

 is called the anomalistic month; it has an aver- 

 age length of 27 days, 13 hours, 18 minutes, 37.4 

 seconds. The sidereal month is the period dur- 

 ing which the moon, if viewed from a fixed star, 

 would seem to make a complete revolution 

 around the earth; this month is 27 days, 7 

 hours, 43 minutes, 11.5 seconds. The proper 

 lunar month, often called the synodical month, 

 is the period from one new moon to the next, 

 an average of 29 days, 12 hours, 44 minutes, 

 2.7 seconds. The synodical month is one of 

 the three natural divisions of time, the other 

 two being the revolution of the earth on its 

 own axis and its revolution around the sun. 

 Another astronomical month is the solar month, 



a twelfth part of the solar year. The solar 

 month, in other words, is the time taken by the 

 sun to pass through one of the signs of the 

 zodiac. 



A calendar month is one of the twelve parts 

 into which the year is divided. In order that 

 twelve calendar months might equal twelve 

 synodical, or true, months, the calendar months 

 were originally reckoned as 29 and 30 days, 

 alternately. This rough approximation was 

 superseded by other attempts to secure a proper 

 relation between the lunar, solar and calendar 

 months. The calendar month now varies from 

 28 to 31 days (see article on each month). 



Days of the Month. In the Gregorian calen- 

 dar each day of the month is known by a num- 

 ber, as the first, or the second, or the twentieth. 

 This has not always been the case. The ancient 

 Greeks divided the month into three periods of 

 ten days, and the French Revolutionary calen- 

 dar, in which all the months were of equal 

 length, used the same system; thus the 15th 

 day of the month was called the fifth day of 

 the second decade. The Romans used an even 

 more complicated system. The Roman calen- 

 dar had three fixed days in each month, the 

 calends, the nones and the ides. From these 

 fixed days the Romans counted backward. The 

 calends were invariably the first day of the 

 month; the ides were at the middle, either the 

 13th or the 15th day; and the nones were the 

 ninth day before the ides, both days being 

 counted. Thus is explained the definiteness of 

 the warning to Julius Caesar to "beware the 

 ides of March." The days between the calends 

 and the nones were called the days before the 

 nones; those between the nones and the ides, 

 the days before the .ides; those between the 

 ides and the calends, the days before the cal- 

 ends of the following month. Thus the last day 

 of February would be called the day before the 

 calends of March (see CALENDAR). W.F.Z. 



MONTICELLO, montisel'o, the home of 

 Thomas Jefferson (which see). 



MONTMAGNY, mawN'ma'nye, the county 

 town of Montmagny County, Quebec. It is on 

 the south bank of the Saint Lawrence River 

 and on the Intercolonial Railway, thirty-six 

 miles east of Levis, which is opposite Quebec, 

 on the Saint Lawrence. Montmagny has im- 

 portant lumbering interests, and among its in- 

 dustrial establishments are lumber, saw and 

 planing mills, a pulp mill, sash and door fac- 

 tory and a wagon factory. There are also sev- 

 eral foundries, shell factories, gristmills and 

 butter factories. The town has the county 



