394 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



THE METEIC SYSTEM: SHALL IT BE COMPULSORY? 



By Professor W. LE CONTE STEVENS, 



WASHINGTON AND LKE UNIVERSITY. 



~^rO tribe of savages has ever been found that did not present some 

 -^^ evidence of the existence of individual property among them. 

 By force of character and personal prowess the chief acquires possessions 

 of increasing variety. Where compulsion can not be directly applied 

 resort is had to exchange, and this at once develops the need for meas- 

 urement of values. Local convenience suggests conventional standards 

 for the measurement of quantity, and custom tends to fix such stand- 

 ards. When a number of tribes have become aggregated into an 

 embryonic nation, the different standards are soon found to need 

 revision. From a group of temporary standards some fall into disuse 

 and the most convenient are retained. The readiest standard of 

 length is some part of the human body, such as the forearm or hand. 

 The cubit is thus one of the most ancient of units. The foot, the 

 pace, the palm, the digit, the inch as the length of the last bone of the 

 thumb, the yard as arm length from mouth to finger tip, all of these 

 are units of unknown antiquity, and accurate enough for the com- 

 mon needs of many who are moderately civilized to-day. 



The unit of length is the primary unit to which finally all others 

 are referred. To derive from it units of surface and volume would 

 appear most natural, and it seems but a short step farther to derive 

 a unit of mass from the unit volume of some selected kind of matter, 

 such as water or earth. But it is safe to say that such a process of 

 derivation was unknown until within the last few centuries or even 

 less. For the comparison of masses scales were early developed, and 

 with the advance of civilization linear units derived from human 

 bodies of variable size gave place to metallic standards prepared and 

 kept by some central authority. From the buried city of Pompeii 

 have been taken steelyards carrying inscriptions which showed that 

 they had been 'proved' by comparison with the standards kept in the 

 Temple of Jupiter at Eome. 



In England the standard of length during the last eight or nine 

 centuries has been the yard, traditionally derived from the length of 

 the arm of King Henry I. about the year 1101. A rod or bar of this 

 length was kept in London, and copies of it, of various grades of crude- 

 ness, received the royal stamp which made them legal measures. 

 One third of this length was called a foot, although about one fifth 



