680 
PHARMACEUTICAL MEETING. 
many years had passed it would be recognized by all to a greater extent than it 
had been hitherto. He believed the difficulty was not so much that of incul¬ 
cating a knowledge of the system, as mastering a knowledge of the value of the 
integers; and that was one great point that he aimed at in his communication. 
His object was to promote the adoption of some means by which they could 
make themselves more thoroughly and generally acquainted w T ith the values of 
the integers. Now, he did not consider that that would be sufficiently effected 
by their merely going into a museum and looking over a set of metrical weights 
and measures. What he wanted to see done, was something analogous to that 
which existed with reference to our own weights and measures. A grain was a 
grain of wheat, the inch was three barleycorns, the foot the length of a man’s 
foot, the yard was the stretch of the arm, which was a yard as nearly as pos¬ 
sible, and most men of ordinary size would step a yard. In this way they per¬ 
fectly familiarized themselves with these integers, and they always had suffi¬ 
ciently definite ideas with reference to them. It appeared to him, that more 
than anything else, it was something of that description that was wanted with 
reference to the metrical system ; and what he should like to see done, and what 
he had already suggested in respect to pharmacy, was to have some articles, 
such as lozenges, that should be made to represent the gram, and which should 
be marked a gram. Pie should like also to see coins of a definite weight with 
the weight marked upon them. There were coins in America which did cor¬ 
respond with the weights, but he wanted to see the weights marked upon them. 
He should like to see also the centimeter marked upon every postage-stamp; 
it would just come into a postage-stamp, being one-third of an inch; so that 
no person would have the excuse of saying that they did not know what a centi¬ 
meter was. In that way he believed they would do more towards placing 
themselves in a position, when the proper time came, to take up this system as a 
substitute for their own, than they could in any other way with equal advan¬ 
tage. That there were great difficulties in bringing about a general adoption 
of the system seemed to be admitted on all hands, and that was the opinion 
which he had entertained, and still entertained himself. He felt, especially 
with regard to medical men, that there would be very great difficulty in in¬ 
ducing them to adopt the metrical system, unless it be very slowly indeed. He 
entirely approved of what Mr. Carteighe had suggested, that in the examina¬ 
tion of medical men the metrical system should be introduced, and that they 
should be compelled in that way to make themselves acquainted with it; and in 
addition to that, some of the works which went into the hands of medical men 
could have the metrical system of weights and measures introduced,—that would 
probably be the most efficient means of preparing them for the adoption of the 
system. He still thought that the introduction of the metrical weights and 
measures, together with our ordinary weights and measures, side by side, in 
the Pharmacopoeia, would do very little good; in fact, he thought it would be 
objectionable, as it would greatly encumber the Pharmacopoeia, and complicate 
the matter, and, as it appeared to him, it would render it more probable that 
errors might be committed in making up these preparations. Moreover, he did 
not thiuk it would teach much. What they wanted was to know the values of 
the integers, and to have clear and definite ideas of these. If they could have 
the two put side by side in a simple form, then it would teach something, but 
where they had to give it in a complicated form, he did not think it would 
teach a great deal. He felt more favourable to the adoption of the suggestion 
of having a sort of supplement to the Pharmacopoeia, in which the metrical 
weights should be introduced, than to their introduction in the Pharmacopoeia 
itself. The discussion altogether had tended to show that pharmaceutists 
generally were desirous of doing all they could to prepare the way for the intro¬ 
duction of this system when the proper time arrived for doing so. 
