638 " PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO 174p, 



the pipe or butt 126 ; the tertian 84 ; the hogshead 63 ; and every barrel 31J-, 

 according to the old assize, and to be gaged by the king's gager." 



In the reign of Edward the 3d, an act passed, to take away the weight called 

 ancell, by which, and subsequent statutes, it is directed, that every sale and 

 buying should be by the even balance. 



In the 11th year of Hen. 7th, complaint being made to the parliament, that 

 the ancient statutes and ordinances of the realm, relating to weights and measures, 

 had not been observed and kept, it was therefore enacted, " that there should 

 be delivered to the knights and citizens of every shire and city, one of every 

 weight and measure, which the king had caused to be made of brass, according 

 to his standard in the exchequer, to be delivered to the respective places men- 

 tioned in the act ; and that the inhabitants of all cities, boroughs, and market 

 towns, should make and use weights and measures made according to the weights 

 and measures so delivered as aforesaid." In the next year another act passed, 

 reciting, " that the king had made such weights and measures of brass, ac- 

 cording to the old standard thereof remaining within his treasury ; which weights 

 and measures, on more diligent examination, had been found defective, and not 

 made according to the statutes and old laws, and were therefore recalled, and 

 ordered to be broken, and other new bushels and gallons were directed to be 

 made and sised, according to a new bushel and gallon to be made according to 

 the assize, to remain in the king's exchequer:" where we now find a bushel in 

 the custody of the chamberlains called the Winchester bushel, and a gallon 

 agreeing to it : on the bushel is the inscription, Henericus septimus Dei gratia 

 Rex Angliae et Franciae. 



In the last mentioned act, the assize for weights and measures is in substance 

 the same as in the old statutes, only the pound is said to be the pound Troy of 1 2 

 ounces. But since by this, and the former assize laws, the pound is directed to 

 be raised from 240 sterling pennies, it follows, that the gravity of the assize 

 pound was always the same; but the dimensions of measures of capacity respec- 

 tively raised from a pound of wine, and a pound of wheat, will be in proportion 

 to each other as the specific gravity of wheat to that of wine or water. 



Thus continued the laws relating to the English standard of weights and mea- 

 sures till after the restoration; when a duty of excise being laid on beer, ale, and 

 other liquors, 36 gallons taken by the gage, according to the standard of the ale 

 quart, (4 of which made the gallon remaining in the exchequer) were to be 

 reckoned as a barrel of beer, and 32 such gallons a barrel of ale ; and afterwards 

 34 such gallons of vinegar (and of beer or ale strong or small without the bills 

 of mortality) were declared to be a barrel ; and all other liquors liable to the ex- 

 cise duty were to pay according to the wine gallon. 



We now find the officers of the revenue determining the contents of our mea^ 



