Clothing Makes the Man

1905

Historical Personages Stripped of Accustomed Raiment Seem Unreal

A meeting of the Custom Cutters' Association of America was held in Philadelphia the other day. J. O. Madison of New York, in explaining the part that clothes play in making the man, said:

"An undraped Caesar never could have quelled rebellion with a speech, nor could, undressed, our great Washington have awed his friends with his impressive dignity. What do we know of Moses, not knowing how he was dressed? And how much greater would our interest be in Aristotle if we knew the kind of clothes he was in the habit of wearing?

"What do we know of Nero or of Judas, ignorant, as we are, of what their clothes were like? And if we knew how St Patrick clothed himself how much more feelingly would the Christian world do reverence to his memory. We know that Adam wore a fig leaf, and he seems, because of this historic fact, more real than if we knew him only as the man whose appetite for apples made tailoring necessary."

The Longest Year on Record — 46 B.C.

1907

The year B. C. 46, by order of Julius Caesar, the then reigning Roman emperor, contained 445 days. To clear away all the confusion which had previously existed in reconciling the lunar with the solar year, Caesar, with the help of Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer, undertook a thorough reform of the calendar. He effected it by making the year now called 46 B. C., "the year of confusion," consist of 445 days and the succeeding years of 365 days, with the exception of every fourth year, which was to consist of 366. This method is called the Julian calendar.

The number of days in the months from January to December before Caesar's time had been respectively 29, 28, 31, 29, 31, 29, 31, 29, 29, 31, 29, 29. These numbers Caesar changed to 31 and 30 alternately, with the exception of February, which was to have 29 in ordinary years and 30 in leap years. In honor of himself he changed to July the name of the month that followed June. The pontiffs in applying the Julian calendar went wrong by inserting leap year every three years instead of every four years, and this continued till the year now called 8 B. C., when the Emperor Augustus ordained there should be no leap year for twelve years, which made leap year occur in 4 A. D. At the same time Augustus gave his own name to the month following July, adding one day to it, which he took away from February.