somewhat indefinite: they have no computation of time beyond the seasons, which are reckoned by the rising height of the grass, the fall of the leaves, and the cold and the hot season. They very seldom reckon in new moons[276]. They have the four seasons therefore. The Indians of Chile have words for our four seasons[277]. The above-mentioned names of the five seasons are those of the Algonquins of Virginia[278]; the Occaneechi of the same district call them:--the budding or blossoming, the ripening, midsummer, harvest or fall, winter[279]. Certain agricultural tribes of the east divided autumn into early autumn, when the leaves change colour, and late autumn, when they fall, but denoted the two periods by entirely different names[280]. Agriculture is responsible for the adding of a fifth season to the four arising from the warm and the cold periods and the times of transition between these[281]. But other transitional periods between the longer seasons also arise independently[282]. The Lapps have names for the four ordinary seasons, but their language also contains compounds like ‘spring-winter’, i. e. late winter,--a compound also known in Swedish (_vår-vinter_)--and ‘autumn-summer’, i. e. late summer[283]. The Lapps of Västerbotten divide the year into _sjeunjestie_, the dark period, and _tjuoikestie_, the bright period. They also have four seasons:--_dalvie_, winter, from the freezing of the lakes till the melting of snow; _geira_, spring, time of snow-melting and spring floods; _gese_, summer, from the time when the earth becomes visible to the fading of the grass; _tjatj_, autumn, from this time until the lakes begin to freeze again. The Lapps speak also of _talve-qvoutel_, mid-winter, _kese-qvoutel_, midsummer, and _tjaktje-kese_, late summer[284]. The Yukaghir of N. E. Sibiria use more often the names of periods or the seasons of the year than the names of the months. They have six seasons. The limits of these seasons can hardly have corresponded in former times to fixed dates. Being at present baptized, they reckon the seasons of the year according to the Greek-Orthodox holidays; and thus we have the following seasons:--1, _puge_, summer, from St. Akulina to Mary’s Day, 13th June to 8th September; 2, _nade_, autumn, from the 8th of September to St. Michael’s Day, 8th of November; 3, _cieje_, winter, from the 8th of November to Purification, 2d of February; 4, _pore_, first spring, from Purification to St. George’s Day, 23d of April; 5, _cille_, the second spring, from the 23d of April to the beginning of snow-melting, usually to St. Nicholas’ Day, 9th of March; the name denotes the icy surface forming during the night on the snow, after having melted during the day, and is also given to a month; 6, _conjile_, the third spring, from the snow-melting period to St. Akulina’s Day[285].