98 TIME-RECKONING. 



The division of tlie day into two halves, each containing 1 2 hours, 

 and each numbered from 1 to 12, is a fertile source of eiTor and 

 inconvenience. 



Travellers who have had occasion to consult railway guides and 

 steamboat time-tables, will be familiar with the inconvenience result- 

 ing from this cause ; none know better by experience how much the 

 divisions ante meridian and pout meridian have baffled their inquiries, 

 and how often these arbitrary divisions have led to mistakes. Wei'e 

 it necessary, innumerable instances could be given. The evil how- 

 ever is one so familiar that it has come to be looked upon as 

 unavoidable, and is, as a matter of course, silently endured. 



The halving of the day has doubtless long been in use, but beyond 

 its claim to antiquity, is a custom that confers not a single benefit, 

 and is marked by nothing to recommend it. 



Another more serious difficulty, foi'ced on the attention by the 

 science of the century, is mainly due to the agency of electricity, 

 employed as a means of telegraphy ; and to steam applied to locomo- 

 tives. These extraordinary sister agencies having revolutionized the 

 relations of distance and time, having bridged space, and drawn into 

 closer affinity portions of the earth's surface previously separated by 

 lon^ and, in some cases, inaccessible distances. 



Lst us take the case of a traveller in North America. He lands 

 at Halifax in Nova Scotia, and starts by a railway to Chicago 

 through the eastern portions of Canada. His route is over the 

 Intercolonial, the Grand Trunk, and other lines. He stops at St. 

 •John, Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton and Detroit. 

 At the beginning of the journey he sets his watch by Halifax time. 

 As he reaches each place in succession, he finds a considerable varia- 

 tion in the clocks by which the trains ai^e run, and he discovers that 

 at no two places is the same time used. Between Halifax and 

 Chicago he finds the railways observing no less than seven different 

 -standards of time. If the traveller remains at any one of the cities 

 Teferred to, he must alter his watch to avoid inconvenience, and 

 perhaps not a few disappointments and annoyances to himself and 

 •others. If, however, he should not alter his watch, he would 

 •discover on reaching Chicago that it was an hour and thu'ty-five 

 minutes faster than the clocks and watches in that city. 



If his journey be made by one of the routes through the United 

 ••States, the variation in time and its inconveniences will not be less. 



