124 TIME-RECKONING. 
Among the several objects which the scheme of cosmopolitan time 
has in view, not the least important is to extend to the world similar 
advantages to those which have been conferred on Great Britain by 
the general adoption of uniform time since the commencement of the 
railway era. 
Meteorologists have felt the necessity of some general scheme of 
reckoning by non-local time, such as that now proposed. The enor- 
mous number of meteorological observations recorded in every part 
of the world are of but little value until accurate allowances are 
made for the differences in local time. The immense labour involved 
will be understood when the number of stations and the number of 
daily and hourly observations are considered. Accordingly, it will 
be seen that meteorological science would derive great advantages 
from the general adoption of uniform time. 
Navigators are required to employ a standard time to enable them 
from day to day, when on long voyages, to compute their longitude. 
For this purpose it is a practice with ships to carry the local time of 
the national observatory of the country to which they respectively 
belong. For example: French ships reckon their longitude by Paris 
time ; British ships by Greenwich time. Cosmopolitan time would 
serve precisely the same purpose as a standard for geographical 
reckoning, and it would be some advantage to the marine of the 
world to have a uniform standard established—the common property 
of all nations, and in common use by land and water everywhere. 
It has already been said that the telegraph provides the means of 
securing perfect accuracy at all stations, however remote ; indeed, 
through this agency, time-keepers may be made to beat time synchro- 
nously all over the globe. Already the length of telegraph lines in 
operation approaches 400,000 miles; and we are warranted in beliey- 
ing that ultimately the means of instantaneous communication will 
ramify through every habitable country, and find its way to every 
port of commercial importance. 
I take the ground that we have entered upon a remarkable period 
in the history of the human race. Discoveries and inventions con- 
tinue to crowd upon each other in almost magical succession, and 
who can tell what progress will be made within the coming fifty 
years? Steam and electricity are really narrowing the limits of the 
world. Lines of telegraph and steam communications, the creations 
of but yesterday, are girdling the earth and bringing the most distant 
countries into close neighbourhood. In a few years the wire and the 
