Page:British Weights and Measures - Superior to the Metric, by James W. Evans.djvu/13



CCASIONALLY one meets in the press some more or less vague reference to the suggested decimalisation of our coinage, and metricalisation of our weights and measures. These two matters are, more often than not, improperly associated, as if the determination of one hinged upon the other, and should be jointly considered. It is really not so. The problem of altering the basis and incidence of our metallic currency may be dealt with, without touching the more important of the two questions.

There are few who have any adequate grasp of the momentous issues involved in determining upon what foundation our system of weights and measures should rest. Much has been written upon the subject. To the great bulk of the people it might as well never have been penned—they know nothing, or practically nothing, of it, and the little information which has reached them has often been of a misleading or negative character.

Royal Commissions and Parliamentary Select Committees have taken evidence, deliberated, and reported; scientists have voiced their views; commercial men have stated their opinions; and the ever present fussy faddist obtrudes himself upon the field. But, to most people, the evidence given, the arguments advanced, theories propounded, and conclusions arrived at, are all as sealed