But the same thing has happened to calendars as
well. Calendars are notoriously inaccurate; they simply cannot be
depended upon. No calendar has ever been entirely veracious, nor ever
will be. Like elastic, they are sometimes too long and sometimes too
short--imperfectly constructed."
He paused and looked at them. "Yes," they said breathlessly, aware
dimly that accustomed foundations were already sliding from beneath
their feet.
"Half the calendars of the world are simply wrong," he continued, more
boldly still, "and the people who live by them are in a muddle
consequently--a muddle about Time. England is no exception to the
rest. Is it any wonder that Time bothers us in the way it does--always
time to do this, or time to do that, or not time enough to finish, and
so on?"
"No," they said promptly, "it isn't."
"Of course," he resumed. "Well, sometimes a nation finds out its
mistake and alters its calendar. Russia has done this; the Russian New
Year and Easter are not the same as ours. Pope Gregory, the
thirteenth, ordered that the day after October 4, 1582, should be
called October 15. He called it the Gregorian Calendar; but there are
lots of other calendars besides--there's the Jewish and Mohammedan,
and a variety of calendars in the East.
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