February 29 — a paradox!
Leap year! Once every four years we add an extra day to February. And thus was born a plot point in Gilbert & Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance.
For some ridiculous reason, to which however, I've no desire to be disloyal, some person in authority-- I don't know who--very likely the Astronomer Royal, has decided, that, although for such a beastly month as February, twenty-eight days as a rule are plenty: One year in every four his days shall be reckoned as nine and twenty. Through some singular coincidence--I shouldn't be surprised if it were owing to the agency of an ill-natured fairy, you are the victim of this clumsy arrangement, having been born in leap year on the twenty-ninth of February. And so, by a simple arithmetical process, you'll easily discover, that tho' you've lived twenty-one years, yet, if we go by birthdays, you're only five and a little bit..Over.
And so poor Frederick must remain a pirate hahahahahaha. I wouldn't have been laughing but then again, I'm not starring in a musical. And we have Julius Caesar to thank for leap day, too.
ReplyDeleteI once read in a book on calendars that in Roman times the leap day was inserted between February 23rd & 24th (or was it the 24th & 25th?). So, if I were to encounter anyone born today, I would tell them that they can celebrate the 28th in other years, as it's leap year Feb 24ths that really lost the day...
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