International Conference Held at Washington Part 22

W. VALENTINER.

I may also mention that the practice that prevails among astronomers at the present time of reckoning the day from noon is by no means without exceptions. There are very important astronomical tables which reckon the day from midnight; for instance, in Delambre's Tables of the Sun; in Burg's, Burckhardt's and Damoiseau's Tables of the Moon; in Bouvard's Tables of Jupiter, Saturn, and Ura.n.u.s, and in Damoiseau's Tables of Jupiter's Satellites, mean midnight is employed as the epoch of the tables. I may also mention that Laplace, in his Mecanique Celeste, adopts the mean midnight of Paris as the origin from which his day is reckoned. Hence there are great authorities, even among astronomers, in favor of commencing the day at midnight.

General STRACHEY, Delegate of Great Britain. Sir, I observe that a very eminent American authority is present in this room, I mean Professor Hilgard. As he was invited to attend the meeting of this Conference, I suggest that the views of the Conference may be taken, whether he may not be invited to express his opinion on the point now under consideration.

The PRESIDENT. With the concurrence of the Conference, the Chair will be most happy to ask Professor Hilgard to do us the favor to give us his opinion upon the question now before the Conference.

No objection was made to the proposition of the President.

Professor HILGARD arose and said. I thank you and the Conference very much for this invitation, and General STRACHEY for having proposed it to the Conference, but my opinion has been squarely expressed both in French and English in the report of a certain committee, that I am in favor of midnight at Greenwich as the beginning of the universal day, and of longitude being calculated both ways from Greenwich. I really cannot add anything to what has been said in the arguments already presented by Professor ADAMS, and I do not think that I ought to detain this Conference a moment by repeating the opinion he has expressed to all the experts in this matter.

I beg you will excuse me for not further ventilating my views. Absence from the city, I regret, has prevented me from availing myself of the invitation earlier.

Sir FREDERICK EVANS, Delegate of Great Britain. I have the honor to address the Conference once more upon the practical aspect of the subject before us as affecting the large body of navigators. I wish to say upon this point that there appears to me, in the address of my colleague, Professor ADAMS, somewhat of a mixing together of two subjects.

The question immediately before us, as I understand it, is whether the commencement of the universal day shall be midnight or noon of the initial meridian. That is what we practically have to decide. Now, I gather from Professor ADAMS' remarks that upon this question the ephemerides which we now employ have some important bearing. I do not think that that should influence us, for this reason, that the next resolution which will come before the Conference "expresses the hope that as soon as may be practicable the astronomical and nautical days will be arranged everywhere to begin at midnight."

This resolution, so far as I understand it, will be the warning to astronomers to begin to make the changes growing out of this resolution which may be necessary for seamen. Therefore, I consider that we may at once proceed to vote upon the question whether the day is to commence at midnight or noon, without any reference to the practice or interests of navigation. In reality, it does not appear to me to affect that subject at all.

I have given some consideration to the practical bearings of this question--whether it should be midnight or noon. What we ought to decide is what will be the least inconvenience to the world at large.

I have ascertained from two of my colleagues, who have given this matter the greatest consideration, that the adoption of midnight will really cause less confusion than noon, for this reason, that all the great colonies of the world would be less affected; that is to say, that the times they are using now would be less affected by midnight than by noon. That being so, it appears to me to be an essential point in coming to a settlement of this question.

Mr. RUIZ DEL ARBOL, Delegate of Spain. I have only to say that I have listened to the remarks about navigators changing the reckoning of time. I do not know whether there are many navigators here, but it is a fact that seamen reckon the day from noon.

The PRESIDENT. I beg the pardon of the Delegate of Spain; but, in the United States navy, we reckon the day from midnight.

Mr. RUIZ DEL ARBOL, Delegate of Spain. I am speaking generally. Now, there is some reason for this rule among seamen, for the only way to find out the position of a ship is to observe the meridian alt.i.tude of the sun; and everybody requires to know, at sea, what has taken place in the course of every day, from the beginning to the last moment of the day; and I think that whatever the rule may be in the United States navy, navigators generally will count their time as they count it now.

I think that navigators will not change the rule now in force, no matter what we may adopt in this Conference.

Commander SAMPSON, Delegate of the United States. I think, Mr.

President and gentlemen, that the change to the adoption of the universal day, beginning at midnight, would be a very decided advantage to navigators. The quant.i.ties as now given in the nautical ephemerides are for noon of the meridian for which they are computed, as Washington, Greenwich, &c. It is very evident that every navigator, in making use of the quant.i.ties given in the nautical almanac, must find the corresponding time at Greenwich, wherever he may be on the surface of the earth. Consequently, if we suppose that navigators are pretty equally distributed, one-half on one side of the earth and one-half on the other side, the Greenwich day for one portion would be the local night for the other.

The usual observations made by navigators at sea consist in a meridian observation of the sun for lat.i.tude, and a morning and possibly afternoon observation of the sun near the prime vertical for longitude. Consequently all navigators, when in the vicinity of the initial meridian, might have their day's work occurring in two astronomical days. On the other hand, those navigators who were in the neighborhood of the 180th meridian would have all their work of one day occurring in the same astronomical day. The first would have the advantage of interpolating for short intervals only, while the second would be obliged to interpolate for much larger intervals.

Consequently, on the whole, it would make no difference to navigators whether the quant.i.ties given in the nautical almanacs were for noon or midnight of the initial meridian. Another consideration, however, would make it very advantageous to have the quant.i.ties given for midnight. That consideration is this: if midnight were chosen, then the universal day would be identical with the nautical almanac day, and navigators would have only ship time and universal time to deal with, while, if the quant.i.ties were given for noon, they would have astronomical time, in addition to the other two. This consideration I think a very important one.

The PRESIDENT. The question will be on the amendment offered by the Delegate of Sweden, Count LEWENHAUPT, which has been read.

The vote was then taken, as follows:

States voting in the affirmative:

Austria, Sweden, Italy, Switzerland, Netherlands, Turkey.

In the negative:

Brazil, j.a.pan, Chili, Liberia, Colombia, Mexico, Costa Rica, Paraguay, Great Britain, Russia, Guatemala, United States, Hawaii, Venezuela.

Abstaining from voting:

France, San Domingo, Germany, Spain.

Ayes, 6; noes, 14; abstaining from voting, 4.

The PRESIDENT then announced that the amendment was lost.

The question then recurred on the original resolution offered by the Delegate of the United States.

RUSTEM EFFENDI, Delegate of Turkey. Mr. President, I have listened with a great deal of interest and attention to the learned arguments bearing upon the proposition under discussion offered by the Hon. Mr.

RUTHERFURD, the Delegate of the United States for the adoption of a universal hour.

This question is of such high importance, and of such interest to every one, that I consider it my duty to make a few remarks upon the subject, as I wish to state clearly the position my government proposes to take in the matter.

I do not pretend to discuss scientifically this subject, which has already been so ably treated by several of the gentlemen present. My task is of a different and inferior order. I merely propose to briefly examine the manner in which the proposition ought to be made, in order that it may be adopted by our respective governments.

The question of a universal hour is not of equal interest and importance to all. The United States of America, although comparatively a young nation, have done so much in the pursuit of science and scientific investigation that they must have more than a common interest on the subject. The vast expanse of their country, stretching over sixty degrees of longitude, with a difference of time of more than four hours, almost compels them to adopt a universal hour. The thousands of miles of railroad tracts covering this continent, facilitating the intercourse between distant places, necessitate a uniform system to avoid confusion. It was, therefore, natural that the United States and Canada should have taken the lead in proposing such a reform, which would likewise benefit other countries, as, for instance, the British Empire, Russia, and Germany.

But there are, at the same time, other countries, like France, Spain, Italy, Scandinavia, etc., that may content themselves with a national hour, owing to the small difference in time within their dominion. For them, the adoption of a universal hour would only be of secondary importance, because it would only affect their international relations.

I hope I may be permitted to remind you of the conclusions arrived at by a commission consisting of scientists, railroad and telegraph officials, &c., appointed by the French Government to express their opinion upon this subject. If I am not mistaken, they recommended a universal hour, stating, however, at the same time, that the benefit to be derived from such an hour would be only of secondary importance for their country. The learned Delegate from France, Professor JANSSEN, will probably be kind enough to inform us whether I am right or not.

The few remarks I have made bring me to the point I wanted to consider more specially. I mean that the originators of the pending proposition, and those directly interested in it, should be induced to modify their proposition somewhat if they wish it to be adopted by other countries. In other words, to leave to each country the greatest lat.i.tude possible in adopting a universal hour.

With regard to the Ottoman Empire, I must state that it is placed in a somewhat exceptional position in this respect, and is, therefore, obliged to ask for more lat.i.tude even than the other countries concerned.

In our country we have two modes of reckoning time: one from noon to noon, or from midnight to midnight, as everywhere else, (heure a la franque), the other (heure a la turque) from sundown to sundown. In this latter case the hours count from the moment when the disk of the sun is bisected by the horizon, and we count twice from _0h._ to _12h._, instead of counting without any interruption from _0h._ to _24h._ We are well aware of the inconveniences this system of counting produces, because _0h._ necessarily varies from day to day, for the interval of time between one sunset and the one following is not exactly 24 hours. According to the season the sun will set earlier or later, and our watches and clocks at Constantinople will be at most about three minutes fast or slow from day to day, according to the season.

Reasons of a national and religious character prevent us, however, from abandoning this mode of counting our time. The majority of our population is agricultural, working in the fields, and prefer to count to sunset; besides, the hours for the Moslem prayers are counted from sundown to sundown.

Therefore it is impossible for us to abandon our old system of time, although in our navy we generally use the customary reckoning or "heure a la franque."

Finally, permit me to state that I am ready to cast my vote in favor of a universal hour, with the precise understanding that the universal hour will have to be limited to international transactions, and that will not interfere with the rules up to now in force in my own country.

Before resuming my seat I wish to thank the President and the members of the Conference for their kind indulgence in having listened to my remarks.

The PRESIDENT, The Chair would remind the Delegate of Turkey that the following resolution was pa.s.sed at our last session:

"_Resolved_, That the Conference propose the adoption of a universal day for all purposes for which it may be found convenient, and which shall not interfere with the use of local or other standard time where desirable."

The very difficulty which the Delegate of Turkey antic.i.p.ates was thus carefully provided for in the resolution just read.

Mr. SANDFORD FLEMING, Delegate of Great Britain. To my mind it is of very great importance that this resolution should be adopted. I have already given generally my views on this question, and therefore I do not intend to trespa.s.s on the attention of the Conference beyond saying a very few words. From what I have already ventured to submit, it will be obvious that I hold that all our usages in respect to the reckoning of time are arbitrary. Of one thing there can be no doubt.

There is only one, and there can only be one flow of time, although our inherited usages have given us a chaotic number of arbitrary reckonings of this one conception. There can be no doubt of another matter; the progress of civilization requires a simple and more rational system than we now have. We have, it seems to me, reached a stage when a unification of the infinite number of time-reckonings is demanded.

This unification will be, to a large extent, accomplished if the resolution be adopted, and by adopting it, it seems to me to be in the power of the Conference to confer lasting benefits on the world.

Universal time will in no way interfere with local time. Each separate community may continue the usages of the past in respect to local time, or may accept whatever change the peculiar conditions in each case may call for. But the use of universal time will not necessarily involve a change; it will rather be something added to what all now possess. It will be a boon to those who avail themselves of it.

To the east of the prime meridian all possible local days will be in advance; to the west all possible days will be behind the universal day.