28o 



NATURE 



[July 23, 1891 



OLD STANDARDS. 



BY a curious accident it has just been discovered that 

 the standard yard and certain other measures and 

 weights which were supposed to have been lost when the 

 Houses of Parliament were destroyed by fire in 1834 are 

 still in existence. The following account of the matter is 

 condensed from a statement in the Times. A reference 

 to the contemporary records shows that after the fire the 

 standard bars of 1758 and 1760 were both found among 

 the ruins, " but they were too much injured to indicate 

 the measure of a yard which had been marked upon 

 them." The principal injury to both of the standards was 

 the loss of the left-hand gold stud, but whether this was 

 caused by the action of the flames or otherwise is not 

 known. When the Palace of Westminster was re- 

 built the two bars were deposited in the Journal Office, 

 and from that time, until the other day, they seem 

 to have been wholly lost sight of About a fortnight 

 ago it happened to be stated in the lobby that one 

 of the duties of the Speaker was to inspect once 

 m every twenty years the standards immured in the sill 

 of the Lower Waiting Hall. Inquiries at the Standards 

 Department of the Board of Trade elicited the fact that, 

 so far from any statutory requirement being imposed 

 upon the Speaker in the direction indicated, Section 35 

 of the Weights and Measures Act-, 1878, which provides 

 for the care and restoration of the Parliamentary copies 

 of the Imperial standards, specially exempts the walled- 

 up copy from periodical inspection and comparison. It 

 was found, however, that in 1871 Speaker Denison took 

 cognizance of the standards ; and this fact was brought 

 to the Speaker's notice. While inquiries were being made 

 as to Speaker Denison's inspection, an official in the 

 Journal Office mentioned that when the contents of that 

 office were recently being transferred to the new wing 

 he had observed among the lumber some old weights and 

 measures. These proved to be the missing standards. 

 On Tuesday last they were examined by Mr. Chaney, the 

 Superintendent of Weights and Measures ; and on 

 Wednesday the Speaker was to visit the Journal Office 

 for the purpose of inspecting them. 



The most important of the standards thus rescued 

 from oblivion are the yard measures constructed by 

 Bird in 1758 and 1760. The former was copied from 

 a bar in the possession of the Royal Society, which 

 was itself a copy of a standard preserved in the 

 Tower ; and the second was constructed unier the 

 directions of a Committee of the House of Commons 

 from the 1758 standard. "Each of these two standard 

 yards consisted of a solid brass bar i "05 in. square in 

 section and 3973 in. long. Near each end of the upper 

 surface gold pins or studs o"i in. in diameter were in- 

 serted, and points or dots were marked upon the gold to 

 determine the length of the yard." The other standards 

 in the custody of the Journal Office are two brass rods 

 answering the description of the old Exchequer yard, and 

 four weights supposed to be certain of the "copies, 

 model, patterns, and multiples " ordered by the House on 

 May 21, 1760, " to be locked up by the clerk and kept by 

 him." The most important weight — the standard troy 

 pound — is not amongst those now brought to light. 



NOTES. 



At some little distance to the north and north-east of Cardiff 

 lies a beautiful piece of hilly country, much frequented by 

 pedestrians, and known as the Black Mountain or Black Forest 

 district. It has not been found practicable by the Local Com- 

 mittee to arrange an official excursion to this district on the 

 occasion of the visit of the British Association to Cardiff; but a 

 project is now being unofficially forwarded for conducting small 

 .parties of not exceeding six visitors each to some of the choicest 



NO. II 34, VOL. 44] 



parts of this country, at a time so arranged as not to interfere 

 with the sittings of the various Sections. Several local gentle- 

 men, thoroughly familiar with the district, have offered to act as 

 guides, and with fair weather most enjoyable excursions are to 

 be anticipated. The country being essentially one for pedestrians, 

 the excursions would take the form of an afternoon walk of from 

 eigh t to twelve miles, with a further walk on the following day 

 of from twenty-five to thirty miles. Any member of the British 

 Association desirous of taking part in one of these excursions 

 can obtain full particulars by applying to the Local Secretaries, 

 9 Bank Buildings, Cardiff, who will forward the applications 

 to the promoters. 



The annual meeting of the French Association for the Ad- 

 vancement of the Sciences will be held at Marseilles, com- 

 mencing on September 17. The special subject chosen for 

 discussion in the Botanical Section is the best mode of arrange- . 

 ment and exhibition for different kinds of botanical cojlections, 

 with the double purpose of the preservation of the specimens 

 and the facilitating of study. 



The Technical and Recreative Institute established by the 

 Goldsmiths' Company at New Cross was opened by the Prince 

 of Wales on Wednesday. In addition to this Institute there are 

 to be two Polytechnics south of the Thames, one in Battersea 

 Park Road, the other in the Borough Road. The memorial 

 stone of the one in Battersea was laid by the Prince of Wales on 

 Monday. 



Prof. M. W. Harrington, the founder of the American 

 Meteorological yournal, has been appointed Chief of the United 

 States Weather Bureau, under the Department of Agriculture 

 in Washington. Prof. Harrington was born in Illinois in 1848, 

 and graduated at Michigan in 1868. In 1879 he was made 

 Professor of Astronomy and Director of the Astronomical Ob- 

 servatory at Ann Arbor, Michigan. From a recent article by 

 him, entitled " How could the Weather Service best promote 

 Agriculture ? " it appears likely that the energies of the new 

 service will be devoted more to the interests of agriculture than 

 to commerce, and that an attempt will be made to issue special 

 weather predictions for the farmer, by means of the multiplica 

 tion of local forecasting stations. There can be little doubt — 

 seeing the large amount of funds under his control — that he 

 will also still further advance the important work of inter- 

 national meteorology which has been so ably conducted by his 

 predecessors. 



The half yearly general meeting of the Scottish Meteorological 

 Society was held in Edinburgh on Wednesday. The report 

 from the Council of the Society was presented ; and papers were 

 read on certain relations of wind, pressure, and temperature at 

 the Ben Nevis Observatories, by Dr. Buchan, and on influenza 

 and weather of London in 1891, by Sir Arthur Mitchell and 

 Dr. Buchan. 



From the official record of the work done in the British 

 Museum during 1890 it seems that there has been a serious 

 decrease in the number of visitors. Special departments, however, 

 have been used more than ever by students ; and it is satisfactory 

 to find that the zoological and geological collections in the 

 Natural History Museum are being more generally appreciated. 



German scientific papers record the death, on June 18, of Dr. 

 Otto Tischler, well known as an archaeologist of wide learning 

 and sound judgment. He especially distinguished himself by 

 his investigation of the burial-mounds of East Prussia. Dr. 

 Tischler was forty-eight years of age. 



Prof. A. Ricc6, Director of the Catania Observatory, who 

 has just returned from a visit to the volcano Stromboli, sends us 

 the following notice of a recent eruption: — "On June 24, 45 



