[ 42 ] 
equal to 1. 1744736 English inchesj blit if one fifth 
©f the rod should be established as the length of 
the American foot, the appendix to Mr. Jeffer¬ 
son's report shews, that there cannot in a single in¬ 
stance, be a coincidence between the old and the 
new measures of length, capacity or weights, in the 
decimal series, and it is evident, that whenever a 
conversion of the old, into the new measures, and 
visa versa, becomes requisite, such large factors 
must be employed as will render the operation ex¬ 
ceedingly lengthy and laborious, even where the 
area of a superficies only, is to be converted from 
the one to the other admeasurement, and much 
Biore so, when the cube is cbncenied, as it must 
liecessarily be in all measures of capacity. It seems 
therefore of some considerable importance, to take 
such a portion of the rod, for the standard unit, of 
the new measures, as shall forego the necessity of 
such large factors, by a division of the rod, which 
may be performed with more accuracy than that 
proposed, to wit : into 587equal parts, or into 
i equal pans. 
Let then the rod be divided into 23 equal parts, 
let one of these parts be subdivided into ten equal 
parts, then will four of the 23 equal parts and 7 
tenths of another, so nearly approximate to the 
English foot, as that the excess will be only about 
the 18000th part of an inch, a difierence so ex^ 
tremely minute as not to be perceptable to sense; 
but if this fractional excess., minute as it is, should 
