A NEW FIRST MERIDIAN.

Globe, Volume XX, Issue 1614, 23 April 1879, Page 4

A NEW FIRST MERIDIAN.

It is admitted by geographers (says the “Times) that the present variety of “First Meridian* ” is extremely embarrassing and not conducive to accuracy. A good many proposals have been made recently for the establishment of a common first meridian for all countries, but, as one might expect, there is want of agreement us to what line should be chosen. The question was taken up at the last International Congress of Geography at Paris, and among the contributions to the subject was a paper by M. B -ut hillior de Beaumont, President of the Geographical Society of Geneva. The subject was brought on a former occasion before the Antwerp Geographical Congress, where it was very thoroughly discussed by competent geographers. The proposal, however, did not receive more than expressions of sympathy and encouragement To propose, as M. de Beaumont says, to take the meridian of Greenwich or any other national meridian as the initial one, is not to advance the question ; rather, it leaves it in statu quo. Nor would it be a happy solution to take the old meridian of Ferro, abandoned by the chief maritimejnutioris and presenting peculiar difficulties in its actual position. At the Congress of Paris of 1875 Jerusalem was proposed, a proposal more creditable to the heart than the head of the professor. Now M. de Beaumont asks, “ Does there exist and can we find a meridian which, by its position on the earth, is sufficiently determined to be taken as the initial meridian, solely on account of its natural and individual character P ” In reply he draws attention to the meridian passing through ,Behring's Straits, as satisfying beyond any other this demand. It is now the 150th meridian west of the island of Ferro, or 30 degrees E., or 10 degrees E. of Paris. This meridian, M. de Beaumont maintain*, can be very easily connected with works based on the principal meridians of Ferro, Paris, Greenwich, &c. It touches the extremity of the American continent at Cape Prince of Wales ; traverses, on the one hand, the whole length of the Pacific without touching any land, and on the other, all Europe, through its centre, from the top of Spitzbergen, passing Copenhagen, Leipzic, Yenice, and Romo ; then cuts the African Continent from Tripoli to Cape Frio, about 18 degrees S. latitude. M. de Beaumont urges several advantages on behalf of the now meridian. It would cut Europe into East and West, thus giving emphasis to a division which has been tacitly recognised for ages; it presents about the largest possible terrestrial arc, from 79 degrees N, to 18 degrees S. latitude, 97 degrees altogether ; thus giving to science the longest continuous line of land as a basis for astronomical, geodetic, and meteorological observations, and other important scientific researches, Passing as it would through a great number of States, it would become a really international meridian, as each nation might establish a station or observatory on the line of its circumference. Such a meridian M. de Beaumont proposes to call mediator, on the analogy of equator. This proposal of M. do Beaumont is strongly approved by the eminent French geographer, M. E. Oortambert, and has received considerable support from other continental geographers. Whether M. do Beaumont’s particular proposal be generally accepted or not, there can bo no doubt of the advantage of having some common international arrangement as to a common meridian for geographical purposes at least,