July 2b, [8S3J 



NA TURE 



303 



lifter, and properly arranged on the centre of the slide. 

 A drop of balsam is next taken up on the glass rod and 

 allowed to fall upon the object and spread a little way 

 beyond it. A half-inch circular cover glass, previously 

 cleaned, is taken up with a pair of smooth-pointed for- 

 ceps, and it-; lower edge allowed to rest against the spring. 

 It is then slowly and very steadily lowered, guided by 

 a mounted needle held in the left hand. In this way a 

 wave of balsam will be driven before it, and will rea*:h 

 the edges of the cover without including any air. Very 

 often the object is displaced by this wave, but this can 

 generally be remedied by a slight pressure with a needle 

 on the side of the cover to which the object has moved. 

 When it is again by this means worked to the centre of 

 the slide, a little firmer pressure should be applied to the 

 centre, so as to press it down and squeeze out all excess 

 of balsam. 



{To be continued?) 



ON THE OLD CALENDARS OF THE 

 ICELANDERS l 



'THE old Icelandic system of measuring time, which 

 ■*• to some extent still holds its ground in the island, 

 has the peculiarity of being based on the week as its 

 fundamental unit of measurement, although it recog- 

 nises a year consisting of fifty two weeks, the 364 days 

 of which were included in twelve months of thirty days 

 each. To the last of fhese months, which belonged to 

 the summer, four days were added under the name of 

 Sumar-auke or " summer addition." In accordance with 

 this arrangement every given day of a month always fell 

 on one and the same day of the week, as in the lunar 

 year's calendar the first day of each month coincides with 

 the period of new moon. 



The Icelandic year was further divided into two half 

 \ears, viz. summer and winter, known as " misseri," the 

 former of which began on a Thursday in April, thence 

 called " summer day,'' and the latter on a Saturday in 

 October, the " winter day." These " misseri '' were more 

 used than the year itself to measure time, and Icelanders 

 gave the name " Misseristal," or half-year's reckoning, to 

 their calendar, while they habitually counted by the weeks 

 of these winter or summer measures in referring to the 

 everyday occurrences of the passing year, just as they 

 spoke of winters and not years, the former being assumed 

 to include the summers which directly followed them in 

 the ordinary course of nature. By an analogous mode of 

 reasoning they spoke of "nights" instead of days in re- 

 ferring to the twenty-four hours of night and day. This 

 custom no longer exists among the modern Scandinavian 

 nations, but traces of it still survive among ourselves in 

 the expressions "fortnight'' and " se'nnight," which are 

 undoubted survivals of an ancient northern mode of 

 reckoning time, unknown to southern peoples. This proof 

 of the prevalence of a system of counting by nights 

 among the common ancestors of the Icelanders and 

 Anglo-Saxons makes it the more remarkable that the 

 modern Scandinavians alone among European races 

 should have a separate word to express the twenty-four 

 hours of a day and night, as dygn in Swedish, and dbgn 

 in Dano-Norwegian, which have been derived from the 

 O.N. dagr, day. 



Each uf the Icelandic "misseri" was divided into two 

 parts, known as " ma/," measures. Of these the second 

 half of winter began on a Friday in January, distin- 

 guished as " midwinter day," while " midsummer day " 

 fell on a Sunday in July, which was the first day of the 

 second half of the Sumar-mal. This last of the four 

 quarters contained ninety-four days, owing to the addi- 

 tion of the four nights of the " Sumar-auke," while the 

 other three contained only ninety da>s each. 



1 " Om Ihlaendernes garale Kalendere. " By Hen" Geelmuyden. Kahtren. 

 No 4, 1883. 



The errors of this method of computation, which gave 

 only 364 days to the year, were early detected, for, as we 

 learn from an interesting manuscript of the twelfth century, 

 known as the " Rimbegla," which is preserved in the Royal 

 Library of Copenhagen, the first reform of the Icelandic 

 calendar was effected by the learned Thorstein Surtr, 

 who, as the grandson of Thorolf Mostrarskegg, one of the 

 original colonists, could scarcely have belonged to a later 

 period than the middle of the tenth century. In accord- 

 ance with the naive mode of narration common to the 

 chroniclers of the time, the " Rimbegla" calls in dreams 

 and visions to explain the introduction of a more correct 

 method of counting time among the Icelanders. Thus 

 we are told that when, after long pondering on the reason 

 why the summer was falling back into spring, Thorstein 

 Surtr bethought himself of a way by which the misseri 

 might be brought again to their ancient courses, he 

 dreamt that he was standing on the Law-Hill of the 

 Althing, and that while all other men slept, he was awake, 

 but when he seemed to himself to be sleeping, all others 

 were watching. This dream was interpreted by the wise 

 Osyv Helgason to imply that while Thorstein spoke at 

 the Law-Hill, all men must keep silence, and that when he 

 ceased speaking all must proclaim aloud their approval of 

 his words. Accordingly, when he proposed at the Thing 

 that in every seventh summer seven nights should be 

 added to the four nights of the " Sumar-auke," all men 

 agreed to the change without question or hesitation. By 

 the adoption of Thorstein's suggestion, the Icelandic year 

 acquired 365 days, similar to that of the ancient Egyptians, 

 although by retaining the early mode of intercalation in 

 the summer term, the old relations between the days of 

 the month and week remained unchanged. From this 

 time forth the expression " Sumar-auke " was applied 

 equally to the original four annual intercalary days, 

 and to the seventh year's week added by Thorstein, 

 which has retained the term to the present age. In the 

 modern calendar the word "aukanaetr," added nights, 

 has, however, replaced the older appellation of " Sumar- 

 auka." 



Soon after the introduction of Christianity into Iceland 

 in 1000, the national calendar was brought into closer 

 relations with the Julian system, on which the clergy 

 everywhere based their determinations of the festivals of 

 the Church, and by adding a week to the old " Sumar- 

 auke" five, instead of four, times in twenty-eight years, 

 the average year acquired an addition of one-fourth of a 

 day, and was thus made to approximate more nearly to 

 the Julian year. 



In the " Rimbegla" full directions are to be found for 

 comparing tbe periods of the beginning and ending of 

 the ancient misseri, or seasons, with the divisions of the 

 year observed in other Christian lands, while this autho- 

 rity is, moreover, the only source from which we obtain 

 a clear insight into the methods originally adopted for 

 determining for any given year the amount of the irregu- 

 larities, known as " Rimspiller," which necessarily occurred 

 in a system that took no account of the Julian leap-year. 

 It is curious to observe that while in Iceland, as else- 

 where in the middle ages, the fixed and movable festivals 

 of the Church were made to regulate the divisions of 

 time, and to fix the periods of political and social events, 

 the old Icelandic modes of computingtime were nevereradi- 

 cated. But although the people continued to count by 

 " misseri," winters, weeks, and nights, the beginnings and 

 endings of the" misseri" were fixed in Christian times 

 by the dates of the great Church festivals, which similarly 

 controlled all national events, and thus we find that the 

 exact date of the annual "Riding to the Thing," and the 

 duration of the session of the Althing, were regulated by 

 the day of the week on which the Festival of St. Peter 

 and St. Paul (June 29) happened to fall. 



The twelve months are spoken of in the older Edda 

 under their respective names, but from the earliest 



