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APPENDIX II. 



ADDED BY THE EDITOR. 



Continental and British Measures, Weights, Degrees of 

 Temperature, and Postage. 



IN 1864 an Act of Parliament under the care of Mr. William 

 Ewart, M.P., was passed for legalizing the use of the metric 

 system of weights and measures in Great Britain and Ireland. 



On the continent, and especially in scientific continental 

 publications, the metric system is almost universally adopted. 

 Its complete decimal character and its extreme simplicity recom- 

 mend it to universal use ; and a series of metric tables has been 

 compiled by Mr. C. H. Dowling, Civil Engineer, in which the 

 British standard measures and weights are compared with those 

 of the metric system*, and a tabular comparison is given of 

 the scales of Fahrenheit's, the Centigrade, and Reaumur's 

 thermometers. Mr. Bowling's tables have been frequently 

 employed in converting Swiss measures and weights and degrees 

 of temperature to British equivalents with reference to practical 

 subjects alluded to in the present volumes. 



Messrs. Macmillan and Co. have published a small treatise, by 

 the Rev. Barnard Smith, M.A., on the metric system of arith- 

 metic, containing the metric tables, with questions for students ; 

 and a comparison of continental and English measures by Mr. 

 Warren De la Rue, F.R.S., was published in Gutch's Alma- 

 nack for 1864. 



* Published hv Lockwood and Co., Stationers' Hall Court, London. 



