A4 SANDFORD FLEMING ON TIME 
request of Congress authoritatively took proceedings to bring the subject prominently to 
the attention of the world. After prolonged diplomatic correspondence with the Govern- 
ments of foreign powers, he invited delegates from all nations to a scientific conference 
at Washington in which the subject should be fully considered. 
The Conference met in the autumn of 1884. Twenty-five nationalities were repre- 
sented. The proceedings extended over the month of October, and they resulted in the 
almost unanimous adoption of seven resolutions bearing upon time-reckoning. 
As no records can be in accord unless a common starting point be agreed upon from 
which computations are to be made, the first resolutions had reference to the determination 
of an initial meridian. The meridian passing through Greenwich was selected. 
In the fourth and fifth resolutions the Conference laid down the following important 
principles :— Ê 
IV. “ That the Conference proposes the adoption of a Universal Day for all purposes 
for which it may be found convenient and which shall not interfere with the use of local 
or other standard time where desirable.” 
V. “That the Universal Day is to be a mean solar day : is to begin for all the world 
at the moment of mean midnight of the initial meridian, coinciding with the civil day 
and date of that meridian, and is to be counted from zero to twenty-four hours.” 
The opening of the National Congress at Washington shortly followed the Inter- 
national Conference. The President regarded the importance of the proceedings to be 
such as to call for special mention of them in his annual message. General Arthur thus 
expressed himself on the subject: “The Conference concluded its labours on the first of 
November, having with substantial unanimity agreed upon the meridian of Greenwich as 
the starting point whence Longitude is to be computed through one hundred and eighty 
degrees eastward and westward, and upon the adoption, for all purposes for which it may 
be found convenient, of a Universal Day, which shall begin at midnight on the initial 
meridian and whose hours shall be counted from zero up to twenty-four.” 
There was no exaggerated importance in these allusions, for the conclusions of the 
Conference are productive of most important results. They make provision for terminat- 
ing all ambiguity in hours and dates and for establishing throughout the world, free from 
national susceptibility and caprice, perfect uniformity in reckoning time. Some years 
may elapse before the new notation becomes the one recognized mode of reckoning ; 
but when it shall have been generally accepted in the practice of daily life, it is cal- 
culated to sweep away the difficulties now experienced and it will add greatly to the 
general convenience of civilized man. 
One of the first practical efforts to direct public attention to the rapidly growing ne- 
cessity for a comprehensive reform in time-reckoning can be found in a paper published in 
the Transactions of the Canadian Institute, Toronto, for the session of 1878-79. ' This paper 
adduces in support of its argument many pertinent facts, and points out that the gigantic 
systems of railways and telegraphs which in modern times have been established in both 
continents have developed social and commercial conditions which never previously 
existed. These conditions have so affected the relations of time and distance as to establish 
the fact that our inherited system of notation is defective; that it is Inconvenient to 

' Time-Reckoning and the selection of a Prime Meridian to be common to all Nations. By Sandford Fleming. 
