Excerpt from Household PhysicsEnglish system is still used in business, although the metric system is employed almost exclusively in science.In order that the unit of length might be a fixed quantity that could be duplicated at any time, those in charge decided to take one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the pole, along the meridian that passed through Paris. A platinum iridium bar Of this length was made and is kept at Sevres, near Paris, at the Bureau Of Weights and Measures. It has since been found that this bar is not exactly equal to the length in tended, so that there is really no means of duplicating it exactly if it Should be lost or destroyed. It is called a meter, and is equal to inches in length.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.