TIME-RECKONING. 125 
rail will have brought men of all races face to face to intercommunicate 
knowledge and dispel prejudices. Sooner or later the barbarous 
custom of dividing the day into two sets of twelve hours, as if 12 was 
the limit of arithmetical knowledge, will be judged at its right value. 
The hands of time-keepers pointing in all conceivable directions at 
the same instant of absolute time will be held as an extraordinary 
anomaly, and steps will be taken to avoid the spectacle of men at the 
one moment nominally living in different hours, in different days, 
and in some extreme cases in different months and years. 
The system of chronometry which we have inherited may have 
been well suited to the purpose for which it was designed long 
centuries agc, when the known world was confined within the pillars 
of Hercules, or it may even have answered all the requirements of 
man a few generations back, before the great modern civilizers, steam 
and electricity, began their work. Now we realize the fact that the 
system is awkward and inconvenient. In a few years—and who 
can count them—may we not find a radical change imperatively 
demanded by the new conditions of the human race. 
It is probably not now unseasonable to discuss the subject. It 
would be a vain task to attempt at once to abolish a custom so 
hoary with age, and so generally practised as our system of com- 
puting time. But the necessity of change once admitted, the public 
mind will gradually become familiar with the idea, and will learn to 
welcome any modification in the system when its expediency is 
established. 
But it will be important first to determine the extent of the 
required modification. The scheme should be well considered go as 
- to be free from the imperfections which result from haste. It should 
be rendered generally acceptable, so that whenever the necessity arises 
in any country or community for its introduction, it may be spontane- 
ously adopted ; the inhabitants feeling assured that they were selecting 
a system eventually to become universal. 
The suggestions I have ventured to offer are presented with the 
view of drawing attention to the subject. They point to the establish- 
ment of a common prime meridian as the first important step, and as 
the key to any cosmopolitan scheme of reckoning. This step taken, 
the more progressive nations would probably promote the establish- 
ment of a comprehensive system of chronometry suitable to every 
condition of civilization, and advantageous to the inhabitants of the 
globe on every line of longitude and on every parallel of latitude. 
