1884.] 
Our Measures and Our Standards. 
739 
V. OUR MEASURES AND OUR STANDARDS. 
By Louis D’A. Jackson, C.E. 
t HESE two subjects, though certainly inter-dependent 
to a very great degree, may be considered distinct 
and separate ; or, if the whole be treated as one 
subject, the distinctions in its two branches should be per- 
petually borne in mind, more especially in reference to 
practical effect. 
Our Measures are, for all purposes of measuring and 
weighing (that is, measuring by weight), the best existing 
national set of measures in the whole world, for the reason 
that a suitable and convenient Unit is provided for every ordi- 
nary want and purpose — a grand advantage that preponderates 
over all defeCts. Our Standards, or, to speak more precisely, 
the arrangements of standards, are worse than barbarous ; 
for they constitute a spoilt and degraded barbarism, in which 
the simplicity, the forethought, and the scientific beauty of 
the original system have been vitiated or obscured. 
The question then arises, “ Does progress then consist in 
revivalism ? ” and it is difficult to answer it in the affirmative 
without much reserve and many limitations. 
But before proceeding to treat of the need of these limit- 
ations, and their inducing causes, let us also notice the 
grand difficulty in dealing with the one subject singly or as 
a whole. It is a dilemma of the following form : — 
With the masses our Measures constitute an inheritance 
of the same sort as our language, our customs, manners, 
habits, and institutions; and this reason is alone sufficient 
to deter them from parting with any of them, while a 
sweeping change would be strongly resisted. Hence if sci- 
entific men, understanding the want of system in our 
Standards, in their mode of determination and construction, 
and in their inter-dependence, should propose any inter- 
ference with them in any way, the undiscriminating public 
immediately jumps at the conclusion that the existing 
measures will be altered. It certainly might be so, though 
we shall later show that it is not inherently necessary that 
it should be, and, besides, explain that it can be avoided 
through the exercise of some additional care and manage- 
ment. But the prima facie argument against all such im- 
provement generally resolves itself into “Hands off from 
