Prof.  ABBE, Delegate of the United States, stated that the Delegate of France, Mr. JANSSEN, had made a very important proposition to the Conference:  That the meridian adopted should be a neutral one.  He said that he had endeavored to determine what a neutral meridian is.  On what principle shall the Conference fix upon a neutral meridian, and what is a neutral meridian?  Shall it be historical, geographical, scientific, or arithmetical?  In what way shall it be fixed upon?  He looked back a little into the history of an important system adopted some years ago.  France determined to give us a neutral system of weights and measures, and the world now thanks her for it.  She determined that the base of this neutral system should be the ten-millionth part of a quadrant of the meridian.  She fixed it by measurement, and to-day we use the metre as the standard in all important scientific work; but is that metre part of a neutral system?  Is our metric system neutral?  It was intended to be, but it is not; we are using a French system.  Had the English, or the Germans, or the Americans taken the ten-millionth part of the quadrant of the meridian, they would have arrived at a slightly different measure, and there would have been an English, a German, and an American measure.  We are using the French metric system.  It was intended to be a neutral system, but it is a French system.  We adopt it because it deserves our admiration, but it is not a neutral system.  The various nations of the world might meet and agree upon some slight modification of this metric system which would agree with the results of all scientific investigations, and thus make it international instead of French; but we do not care to do that, and are willing to adopt one system, taking the standard of Paris as our standard.  How shall we determine a neutral system of longitude?  The expression “neutral system of longitude” is a myth, a fancy, a piece of poetry, unless you can tell precisely how to do it.  He would vote for a neutral system if the French representatives can tell the Conference clearly how to decide that it is neutral, and satisfy them that it is not national in any way.

Mr. JANSSEN, Delegate of France, said: 

I perfectly understand the objection of my honorable colleague, Prof.  ABBE.  He asks what is a neutral meridian, and adds that the metre itself does not appear to him to be a neutral measure, but to be a French measure.  He relies upon the consideration that if the English, the Americans, and Germans, in adopting a definition of the metre, had measured it for themselves, they would have arrived each at a slightly different result, which would have given us an English, American, and German metre; nevertheless, he adds, we use the French metre, because we find it so admirable.