and trouble, and disable all our present records and much of our literature also, to the after generations requiring translation into other terms to be understood. Even the necessary little change from old style to new style in the calendar still embarrasses at times, though made so long ago. This change of metres would necessarily touch all our charts, surveys, land records, dispensatories, prescription books, formulas of arts and manufactories, entailing upon the people expenditure, losses, and inconvenience beyond estimate for generations together.”
So late as 1899 Herbert Spencer declared: “My opinion is that, should the attempt ever be made to force it [the metric system] on the English people, not as submissive as the Continentals, the resistance will be so determined that the attempt will have to be abandoned.’
Curiously enough we have on record some instances of the difficulty in dealing with old forms of measures, which should serve as forceful examples of the vast amount of trouble in store for us should any alteration to the metric system be unhappily sanctioned. In 1835 it was made illegal to sell fish by the “cran” in Scotland, where it was in use. Those who take their spoil from the sea proved stubborn, and in 1889 the use of the “cran” as a measure was re-legalised. Again, the ell was practically made illegal in 1601, when a new yard measure was constructed by a Commission appointed by Queen Elizabeth. It remained in general use, however, till 1824, when it was again declared illegal, and in 1835 a very stringent law had to be adopted to prevent its use. Moreover the carat, an ancient Arabic weight, used in the weighing of diamonds and other precious stones, has never been legalised, yet no attempt is likely to
