424 THE YARD, PENDULUM, AND METRE. 



And so, among all nations whose measures have been 

 handed down to us, we find in speaking of the unit of 

 length, some members of the human person designated. 

 Thus, the bed of the gigantic king of Basan is related to 

 have measured eight cubits in length "after the cubit 

 (/>., the fore-arm) of a man." The height of Goliath 

 the Philistine was "six cubits and a span" The bow 

 of Pandarus, described by Homer, was formed of 

 the horns of an Ibex, which grew out sixteen palms 

 (or hand-breadths) from his head. The Romans 

 reckoned their distances by intervals of 1000 paces 

 (millia passuum} whence our name for a mile, though 

 differing widely in reality. If, however, we may judge 

 from the great diversity in the actual lengths adopted 

 under the common name of " a foot " as the standards 

 of different nations, we shall see reason to believe that 

 the typical foot selected was usually that of an indi- 

 vidual some Chief, King, or High Priest, who could 

 claim pre-eminence among them as a man par excellence, 

 and who would seem to have been generally above the 

 average stature. Thus we find the Roman foot equi- 

 valent to 1 1 -6 of our inches; the English to 12 ; the 

 Greek to 12-1; the French to 12-8; and the Egyptian 

 or "Drusian" to 13-1 all of them (especially the two 

 last) in excess of the real length of the foot of a well- 

 proportioned man of medium stature (say 5ft. loin.) 

 which does not exceed lof, or at the most n inches. 



(5 ) Another class of objects, which, from the univer- 

 sality of their occurrence in vast numbers, and their 

 general uniformity of dimension, would naturally occur as 



