TIME OR CHRONOLOGY.
Sixty seconds make a minute;
Time enough to tie my shoe
Sixty minutes make an hour;
Shall it pass and nought to do?
Twenty-four hours will make a day
Too much time to spend in sleep,
Too much time to spend in play,
For seven days will end the week,
Fifty and two such weeks will put
Near an end to every year;
Days three hundred sixty-five
Are the whole that it can share.
Saving leap year, when one day
Added is to gain lost time;
May it not be spent in play,
Nor in any evil crime.
Time is short, we often say;
Let us, then, improve it well;
That eternally we may
Live where happy angels dwell.
AVOIRDUPOISE WEIGHT.
Sixteen drachms are just an ounce,
As you'll find at any shop;
Sixteen ounces make a pound,
Should you want a mutton chop.
Twenty-eight pounds are the fourth
Of an hundred weight call'd gross;
Four such quarters are the whole
Of an hundred weight at most.
Oh! how delightful,
Oh! how delightful,
Oh! how delightful,
To sing this rule.
Twenty hundreds make a ton;
By this rule all things are sold
That have any waste or dross
And are bought so, too, I'm told.
When we buy and when we sell,
May we always use just weight;
May we justice love so well
To do always what is right.
Oh! how delightful,
&c., &c., &c.
APOTHECARIES' WEIGHT.
Twenty grains make a scruple,--some scruple to take;
Though at times it is needful, just for our health's sake;
Three scruples one drachm, eight drachms make one ounce,
Twelve ounces one pound, for the pestle to pounce.
By this rule is all medicine mix'd, though I'm told
By Avoirdupoise weight 'tis bought and 'tis sold.
But the best of all physic, if I may advise,
Is temperate living and good exercise.
DRY MEASURE.
Two pints will make one quart
Of barley, oats, or rye;
Two quarts one pottle are, of wheat
Or any thing that's dry.
Two pottles do one gallon make,
Two gallons one peck fair,
Four pecks one bushel, heap or brim,
Eight bushels one quarter are.
If, when you sell, you give
Good measure shaken down,
Through motives good, you will receive
An everlasting crown.
ALE AND BEER MEASURE.
Two pints will make one quart,
Four quarts one gallon, strong:--
Some drink but little, some too much,--
To drink too much is wrong.
Eight gallons one firkin make,
Of liquor that's call'd ale
Nine gallons one firkin of beer,
Whether 'tis mild or stale.
With gallons fifty-four
A hogshead I can fill:
But hope I never shall drink much,
Drink much whoever will.
WINE, OIL, AND SPIRIT MEASURE.
Two pints will make one quart
Of any wine, I'm told:
Four quarts one gallon are of port
Or claret, new or old.
Forty-two gallons will
A tierce fill to the bung:
And sixty-three's a hogshead full
Of brandy, oil, or rum.
Eighty-four gallons make
One puncheon fill'd to brim,
Two hogsheads make one pipe or butt,
Two pipes will make one tun.
A little wine within
Oft cheers the mind that's sad;
But too much brandy, rum, or gin,
No doubt is very bad.
From all excess beware,
Which sorrow must attend;
Drunkards a life of woe must share,--
When time with them shall end.
The arithmeticon, I would just remark, may be applied to geometry.
Round, square, oblong, &c. &c., may be easily taught. It may
also be
used in teaching geography. The shape of the earth may be shewn by
a ball, the surface by the outside, its revolution on its axis by
turning it round, and the idea of day and night may be given by a ball
and a candle in a dark-room.
As the construction and application of this instrument is the result
of personal, long-continued, and anxious effort, and as I have rarely
seen a pirated one made properly or understood, I may express a
hope that whenever it is wanted either for schools or nurseries,
application will be made for it to my depot.
I have only to add, that a board is placed at the back to keep the
children from seeing the balls, except as they are put out; and that
the brass figures at the side are intended to assist the master when
he is called away, so that he may see, on returning to the frame,
where he left off.
The slightest glance at the wood-cut will shew how unjust the
observations of the writer of "Schools for the Industrious Classes,
or
the Present State of Education amongst the Working People of England,"
published under the superintendance of the Central Society of
Education, are, where he says, "We are willing to assume that Mr.
Wilderspin has originated some improvements in the system of Infant
School education; but Mr. Wilderspin claims so much that many persons
have been led to refuse him that degree of credit to which he is
fairly entitled. For example, he claims a beneficial interest in
an instrument called the Arithmeticon, of which he says he was the
inventor. This instrument was described in a work on arithmetic,
published by Mr. Friend forty years ago. The instrument is, however,
of much older date; it is the same in principle as the Abacus of the
Romans, and in its form resembles as nearly as possible the Swanpan
of the Chinese, of which there is a drawing in the Encyclopaedia
Brittanica. Mr. Wilderspin merely invented the name." Now, I defy
the writer of this to prove that the Arithmeticon existed before I
invented it. I claim no more than what is my due. The Abacus of the
Romans is entirely different; still more so is the Chinese Swanpan;
if any person will take the trouble to look into the Encyclopaedia
Britannica, they will see the difference at once, although I never
heard of either until they were mentioned in the pamphlet referred to.
There are 144 balls on mine, and it is properly simplified for infants
with the addition of the tablet, which explains the representative
characters as well as the real ones, which are the balls.
I have not yet heard what the Central Society have invented; probably
we shall soon hear of the mighty wonders performed by them, from one
end of the three kingdoms to the other. Their whole account of the
origin of the Infant System is as partial and unjust as it possibly
can be. Mr. Simpson, whom they quote, can tell them so, as can
also some of the committee of management, whose names I see at the
commencement of the work. The Central Society seem to wish to pull me
down, as also does the other society to whom reference is made is the
same page of which I complain; and I distinctly charge both societies
with doing me great injustice; the society complains of my plans
without knowing them, the other adopts them without acknowledgment,
and both have sprung up fungus-like, after the Infant System had been
in existence many years, and I had served three apprenticeships to
extend and promote it, without receiving subscriptions or any public
aid whatever. It is hard, after a man has expended the essence of his
constitution, and spent his children's property for the public good,
in inducing people to establish schools in the principal towns in
the three kingdoms,--struck at the root of domestic happiness, by
personally visiting each town, doing the thing instead of writing
about it--that societies of his own countrymen should be so anxious
to
give the credit to foreigners. Verily it is most true that a Prophet
has no honour in his own country. The first public honour I ever
received was at Inverness, in the Highlands of Scotland, the last was
by the Jews in London, and I think there was a space of about twenty
years between each.
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