This year's Fall Reading Period will last only ten days, but harried students have only the Gregorian calendar to blame, Registrar Sargent Kennedy explained yesterday. It seems the length of the pre-exam respite undergoes cyclic variations, and the lean years have set in.

All this is because University statutes fix the start of the Christmas vacation and the beginning of the Spring Term in such a way that the crucial time between them varies with the calendar.

Monday after the first Sunday in February is decreed as the opening of the new term, while winter vacation must start on the Sunday before Christmas or on the preceding Thursday if Christmas falls on a Sunday before Christmas or on the preceding Thursday if Christmas falls on a Sunday.

One consolation is that the Spring Reading Period undergoes no such vicissitudes. University rules set its length at an immutable 18 days.