REFORM  IN  WEIGHTS  AND  MEASURES. 
35 
it  may  be  made  to  supersede  the  present  standards,  by  not  in- 
volving too  wide  a  departure  from  present  well-known  quanti- 
ties. 
From  several  reports  which  I  have  read,  it  appears  that  a  plan 
proposed  by  Mr.  J.  F.  Felton,  of  New  York,  is  recommended — 
one  which  is  the  result  of  17  years  labor  in  this  hitherto  unfruit- 
ful field,  and  to  which,  in  its  general  principles,  I  give  my  un- 
qualified admiration.  But  as  the  adoption  of  any  new  system  is 
worthy  of  previous  careful  consideration,  and  it  is  incumbent 
upon  all  who  feel  interested  in  the  subject  to  give  their  views,  if 
differing  from  those  offered  the  public,  the  writer  is  led  to  sub- 
mit the  following  remarks  in  regard  to  the  unit  proposed  in  the 
plan  alluded  to. 
Mr.  Felton  proposes,  in  his  plan,  not  to  disturb  the  most  im- 
portant commercial  weight  now  employed — the  avoirdupois 
pound  of  7000  grains — but  to  adopt  it  as  the  unit  in  his  new  sys- 
tem, and  to  create  the  scale  by  decimal  divisions  and  multiples 
of  this  weight,  using  in  the  scale  names  now  employed  for  nearly 
similar  weights. 
The  three  orders  of  weight— Troy,  Apothecaries  (the  pound 
in  each  being  5760  grains,)  and  Avoirdupois  (the  pound  being 
7000  grains) — he  supersedes  by  the  establishment  of  one,  the 
scale  as  follows : 
EQUIVALENT  IN  PRESENT  STANDARDS. 
1  grain  =    7-10  of  1  grain. 
10  grains  =     1  scruple  =    7  grains. 
10  scruples  =     1  dram  =    1  1-6  drachms  Apoth. 
ia  A„„™r,  i  I  1  ounce  3  dr.  2  sc.  Apoth. 
10  drams  =     1  ounce  =  *?  ,  0„0  -       .  r. 
}  1  ounce  262.-5  gr.  Avoir. 
10  ounces  =  1  pound  =  1  pound  Avoirdupois. 
10  pounds  =  1  stone  =  5-7  of  1  stone. 
10  stones  =  1  hundred  weight  less  than  cwt.  by  12  lbs. 
10  hundred  weight  =  1  ton  "  ton  by  1240  lbs. 
In  the  above  scale,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  pound  (commer- 
cial) alone  remains  unchanged — the  grain  being  reduced  to  the 
ten-thousandth  part  of  the  pound,  or  seven-tenths  of  the  present 
grain. 
Now,  I  differ  from  Mr.  Felton  in  regard  to  the  practicability 
of  adopting  the  Avoirdupois  pound  as  a  unit,  and  propose,  in 
place  of  it,  the  grain  now  employed;  because,  while  I  admit 
that  the  Avoirdupois  pound  may  be  the  most  important  weight 
of  our  standards  in  ordinary  commercial  transactions,  yet  I 
believe,  if  the  present  arrangement  is  to  be  disturbed  at  all,  and 
