SEASONS CHANGING

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 305, 21 September 1936, Page 8

SEASONS CHANGING

Equinox on Wednesday The promise of the warmer days of spring is marked on the calendar by the occurrence of the vernal equinox next Wednesday. The selection of the equinox as the first day of spring is, however, a purely arbitrary arrangement, for t,he meteorological seasons vary somewhat from year to year according to the recorded temperatures, and never exactly coincide with the calendar seasons. For the past six months the sun has been to the north of the equator and the southern hemisphere has received the least benefit from its rays. On Wednesday it will pass to the south of the equator and thereafter will move steadily southward until the longest day, which will occur in mid-Deeember. Although theoretically day and nigto. on Wednesday are of equal length, as is indicated by the term “equinox,” the system of time, together with various minor influences, masks this state of affairs, so that on Wednesday the sun will apparently lie above tlie horizon for 12 hours S minutes and below it for only 11 hours 52 minutes. If the times of sunrise and sunset were the only factors to be considered yesterday would have been the equinox, for the sun was then above the horizon for exactly 12 hours of mean solar time, the time shown on clocks.