SCIENCE. 
53 
scientific spirit in the difficult work of attaining it, and in 
the almost equally important task of bringing it into gen- 
eral and respected use. I call this a standard for conve- 
nience, and not in a strict or ultimate sense. Strictly it is 
only an authenticated copy of a standard, or a portion of a 
standard, namely, of the world’s standard meter or stan- 
dard yard ; and hence, the importance, not fully shared by 
the original metre itself, of corresponding perfectly with 
its theoretical length. 
The adoption of the metric system has a formal sound, 
and its difficulties have been, to say the least, well repre- 
sented. But, to the extent of its use in micrometry, it 
really presents no difficulties and many advantages. The 
value of the millimeter and its decimals must be made 
familiar to the mind for other purposes, even for the under- 
standing of exclusively English literature, and to use it for 
our measurements and statements will merely assist to keep 
it fresh in mind. The English system, or rather tradition, 
presents no pair of units so convenient for the microscopist 
as the millimeter for large objects and the x-ioooth milli- 
meter for small ones. For the purposes of most people, for 
use in micrometry alone, it is sufficient to remember that 
the millimeter is about one twenty-fifth of an inch, and 
surely this is no great intellectual task. Nor would it 
waste a large portion of a lifetime to learn the whole series 
from the meter down, remembering that, in round numbers, 
the meter is a yard, with three or four inches to spare, the 
decimeter one-tenth of that 40 inches, or 4 inches, the 
centimeter one-hundredth of that 40 inches, or 4-ioths 
of an inch, and the millimeter one-thousandth of- that 40 
inches, or 4-iooths, or 1-251I1 of an inch. The real difficulty 
lies, I believe, not in memorizing the value of the few 
new units required, but in the awkward and useless 
habit of stopping to translate every item from the new unit 
to an old one. Any one can add a few new words to his 
vocabulary, a few new units to his tables, without harm. 
The telephone and the phonograph have brought no disaster 
along with their new double Greek names. An educated 
person can learn in an hour all the new terms, values and 
proportions of the whole metric system, with its interesting 
and suggestive relations ; and the time would be well 
spent though he never used the system again. But I know 
by experience that he can also use it again, easily. When 
you once learn by a little practice to think in the new 
units the same as in the old, the apprehended difficulties 
vanish unaccountably and can scarcely be brought to mind. 
If asked to estimate the width of this room in yards, only 
a child unfamiliar as yet with the practical use of measures 
would say to himself, “ It seems to be about 90 feet, which 
would be 30 yards.” You would rather look at the wall 
to see how many times longer than a yard it is. So if you 
will take a metric rule, learn well how the millimeter looks, 
and its dek, the centimeter, and learn to use it in measur- 
ing and estimating the size of suitable objects, such as ; 
insects or flowers, you will find it as easy to think in milli- J 
meters as in lines, inches, feet, or yards, to say nothing of j 
the comfort of knowing that you are in no danger of being 
lost between several kinds of the same name. 
Aside from the selfish though sufficient motive of our 
convenience, I hope we shall practically adopt the metric 
system, because we can thus contribute a trifle of influence 
toward its general introduction. It seems plain enough 
now that our country made a serious mistake in not adopt- | 
ing it at first; and I am satisfied that it is still best for us j 
to use it, notwithstanding the greatly increased difficulties j 
in our way. It is not questioned that this is the best 
system ever tried or proposed, and the only one that can 
possibly come into general use ; it is not denied that it 
would simplify education, and substitute order and 
intelligible relations for the confusion of our present 
metrology ; it possesses as many points of convenient 
relationship to our old system as could reason- 
ably be expected in any new one ; it is ad- 
mitted to be excellently adapted to all scientific work ; 
it has been satisfactory to mechanics and manufacturers 
who have actually used it ; it has been gradually and com- 
pletely introduced intolarge shops using costly tools and ma- 
chinery, without serious expense, and to the satisfaction of the 
managers. Almost without exception its friends are those 
who have used it, and objections to it come from those who 
have not. You hear less of the evils it has caused than of 
those it would cause. Furthermore, it offers us a carefully 
elaborated scheme of international co-operation, which we 
have but to adopt in order to place ourselves in harmony 
with the rest ; the metric system is all international. It also 
unifies almost entirely the records made by persons adopt- 
ing different units, since a statement of size will be practi- 
cally the same to the eye and to the ear, and will require no 
formal mathematical reduction, whether in centimeters, 
millimeters, or in decimals of a millimeter. Fortunately 
we have all tried the experiment for ourselves, in one de- 
partment, and know what some of the objections are worth. 
Our system of currency is precisely like the metric series 
of weights and measures ; and is marked essentially by the 
same evils and benefits. Who now believes that having 
adopted a currency incompatible with the English system 
has caused us a hundredth part of the trouble it has saved, 
notwithstanding that it lacked the advantage of putting us 
in harmony with the rest of the world ? Who now feels cut 
off from the past because of the change, or regrets the loss 
of the pounds and shillings so long as he has dollars 
enough and of the right kind (it is not easy to satisfy 
everybody about that)? Who has found the poor oppressed 
and the laboring classes annoyed by the system we adopted ? 
Who has yet incurred a burdensome expense in hiring ac- 
countants skilled in a foreign and to us obsolete nomen- 
clature to compute from the records of the past how many 
pounds, shillings and pence our grandmothers paid for 
their bonnets, or our grandfathers for their ships or their 
farms? The truth is the new system is so much better for 
our present purposes that we are glad to use it as soon as 
we fairly know how ; and I believe that the same would be 
true of the whole metric system. We do not undervalue 
the records of the past, with their elaborate computations, 
and tables, and surveys ; but few of the people of to-day 
come in contact with these directly, and those few could 
afford the extra trouble for the sake of the far greater inter- 
ests involved. It is not scholars to whom learning in an 
unfamiliar form is a terror; they will spend lifetimes in 
working over such lore, merely for the pleasure of the 
work. And so much of it as is required for use in the 
daily life of the illiterate world is consistantly modified, and 
modernized, and adapted, by specialists of various kinds 
who inherit the progress of the past but adopt the fashions 
of the present. 
To adapt a homely phrase which has remarkably vindi- 
cated itself, in another field in recent history, the proper 
wav to introduce the metric system is to introduce it ; not 
to decide why others should use it, but to use it ourselves. 
Nor need we wait to be certain of the feasibility of securing 
its universal use. It may be profitably used in science 
though not accepted in trade. The chemists have adopted 
it fully and with satisfaction in their work, in their teach- 
ings and in their books ; the physicians are adopting it in 
different parts of the country, and the microscopists may 
well enjoy its facilities whether others do so or not. — 
(. Inaugural Address, Buffalo, 1879.) 
Experience, says the Electrician, has shown that the life 
of a submarine telegraph cable is from ten to twelve years 
If a cable breaks in deep water after it is ten years of age it 
cannot be lifted for repairs, as it will break of its own 
weight ; and cable companies are compelled to put aside a 
large reserve fund in order that they may be prepared to re- 
place their cables every ten years. The action of the sea- 
water eats the iron wire completely away, and it crumbles 
to dust, while the core of the cable may be perfect. The 
breakages of cables are very costly, and it is a very difficult 
matter to repair them, in comparison with a land line. A 
ship has to be chartered at an expense of $500 a day for two 
or three weeks in fixing the locality, and in avoiding rough 
weather, as cables can only be repaired in the calmest sea- 
sons. One break alone in the Direct Company’s cable cost 
them ,£20,000 to repair, and the last chance left to the com- 
pany was to make an agreemen with the Anglo-American, 
so that they should be protectee and have the use of that 
company’s line when their Own vas stopped. 
