alpines
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: British weight measures

To: Victor Hughes <hughes@scides.canberra.edu.au>
Subject: Re: British weight measures
From: Bill Mounce <bmounce@bellatlantic.net>
Date: Tue, 26 Mar 2002 21:15:02 -0500
Vic, convert that to ergs per square acre, and you win the prize!  Bill

Victor Hughes wrote:

> Bill, well a pitch is where cricket (no Jan E and Pete C, not Plymouth 
>Cricket)
> matches are played, and a cricket pitch is 22 yards long.  Same length as a 
>chain,
> which is surprising as the timing chain on my Alpine looks nowhere near that 
>long.
> 10 chains to a furlong (I know it's hard to believe the imperial system used 
>10 of
> anything to make up something else), 8 furlongs to a statute mile (one of two 
>miles
> used, the other being the nautical mile) and 12 furlongs to a league.
>
> All of which goes to show that the Imperial system was actually devised by 
>sadistic
> schoolmasters to torture small children with problems like "If a man had 
>enough
> apples to reach from one end of a cricket pitch to another, and the apples 
>had an
> average circumference of 3 nails, and were priced 3 shillings, sixpence and 3
> farthings a dozen, how much would all the apples cost (including VAT) 
>(allowing for
> the curvature of the earth)"
>
> Cheers and a Firkin of brown bubbly to all
>
> Vic
>
> Bill Mounce wrote:
>
> > Vic, can you now fill us in on pitches, chains, furlongs and leagues?  God, 
>I
> > miss the Imperial system!  Bill in plain old Pennsylvania.

<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>