To turn grains into grammes, multiply the number by 648 and divide the product by 10,000.
To turn grammes into grains, multiply by 10,000, dividing the result by 648.
The metric system is especially useful in our local jewellery and other trades, but it is very slowly making its way against the old English foot and yaid, even such a learned man as Professor Rankine poking fun at the foreign measures in a comic song of which two verses run:—
Some talk of millimetres, and some of kilogrammes,
And some of decillitres to measure beer and drams;
But I'm an English workman, too old to go to school,
So by pounds I'll eat, by quarts I'll drink, and work by my two-foot rule.
A party of astronomers went measuring of the earth,
And forty million metres they took to be its girth;
Five hundred million inches now go through from pole to pole,
So we'll stick to inches, feet, and yards, and our own old two-foot rule.
Mid-England.—Meriden, near Coventry, is believed to be about the centre spot of England.
Midland Institute.—Suggestions of some such an institution, to take the place of the defunct Mechanics', had several time appeared in print, but nothing definite was done in the matter until the subject was discussed (June 4, 1852) over the dinner table of Mr. Arthur Ryland. Practical shape being given to the ideas then advanced, a town's meeting on Dec. 3, 1853, sanctioned the grant by the Council of the land necessary for the erection of a proper building, and an Act of Incorporation was obtained in the following Parliamentiry session. In December 1854, Charles Dickens gave three readings in the Town Hall, in behalf of the building fund, whereby £227 13s. 9d. was realised, the donations then amounting to £8,467. The foundation stone was laid by Prince Albert, on Nov. 22, 1855, and the contract for the first part of the building given to Messrs. Branston and Gwyther for £12,000. The lecture theatre was opened Oct. 13, 1857, when addresses were delivered by Lord Brougham, Lord Russell, and Lord Stanley, the latter delivering the prizes to the students who had attended the classes, which were first started in October, 1854, at the Philosophical Institute. In 1859, the portrait of David Cox was presented to the Institute, forming the first contribution to the Fine Art Gallery, which was built on portion of the land originally given to the Institute, the whole of the buildings being designed by Mr. E.M. Barry. The amount subscribed to the building fund was about £18,000, and the coat, including furniture and apparatus more than £16,000. Great extension has been made since then, on the Paradise Street side, and many thousands spent on the enlargement, branch classes bring also held at several of the Board Schools to relieve the pressure on the Institute. In 1864, the members of the Institute numbered 660, and the students 880, with an income of £998; in January, 1874, there were 1,591 members, 733 family ticket holders. 2,172 students, and an income of £2,580. At the end of 1833, the number of annual subscribers was 1,900, and lecture ticket-holders 838. In the Industrial Department there were 4,334 students; the Archæological Section numbered 226 members, and the musical Section 183. 108 students attended the Laws of Health classes, 220 the Ladies classes, and 36 the classes for preparation for matriculation. The benefits derived from the establishment of the Midland Institute, and the amount of useful, practical, and scientific knowledge disseminated by means of its classes among the intelligent working men of the town and the rising generation, is incalculable. These classes, many of which are open at the low fee of 1d., and some others specially for females, now include the whole of the following subjects:—English language and literature, English history, French, German, Latin, Greek, and Spanish, algebra, geometry, mensuration, trignometry, and arithmetic, music, drawing, writing, English grammar, and composition, botany, chemistry, experimental physics, practical mechanics, and metallurgy, elementary singing, physical geography, animal physiology, geology, practical plane and solid geometry, &c. The general position of the Institute with regard to finance was as follows:—Gross receipts in General Department, £3,281 5s. 6d.; expenditure in this department (including £998 1s. 6d. deficiency at the close of the year 1882), £3,088 17s. 2d.; balance in favour of the General Department, £192 8s. 4d. Gross receipts in Industrial Department, £1,747 13s.; expenditure in this department, £3,173 7s. 10d.; deficiency, £l,425 14s. 10d., met by a transfer from the funds of the General Department. The total result of the year's operations in both departments left a deficiency of £1,233 6s. 6d. The amount due to bankers on the General Fund was £863 13s. 6d; and the amount standing to the credit of the Institute on the Repairs Account is £440 12s. 2d. It is much to be regretted that there is a total debt on the Institute, amounting to £19,000, the paying of interest on which sadly retards its usefulness. Many munificent donations have been made to the funds of the Institute from time to time, one being the sum of £3,000, given by an anonymous donor in 186[**], "in memory of Arthur Ryland." In August, same year, it was announced that the late Mr. Alfred Wilkes had bequeathed the bulk of his estate, estimated at about £100,000, in trust for his two sisters during their lives, with reversion in equal shares to the General Hospital and the Midland Institute, being a deferred benefaction of £50,000 to each.
Midland Metropolis.—Birmingham was so entitled because it was the largest town, and has more inhabitants than any town in the centre of England. To use a Yankeeism, it is "the hub" of the Kingdom; here is the throbbing heart of all that is Liberal in the political life of Europe; this is the workshop of the world, the birth-spot of the steam-engine, and the home of mock jewellery. In all matters political, social, and national, it takes the lead, and if London is the Metropolis of all that is effete and aristocratic, Birmingham has the moving-power of all that is progressive, recuperative and advancing. When Macaulay's New Zealander sits sadly viewing the silent ruins of the once gigantic city on the Thames, he will have the consolation of knowing that the pulse-beats of his progenitors will still be found in the Mid-England Metropolis, once known as the town of Burningsham or Birmingham.
Mild Winters.—The winter of 1658-9 was very mild, there being neither snow or frost. In 1748 honeysuckles, in full bloom, were gathered near Worcester, in February. In the first four months of 1779 there was not a day's rain or snow, and on the 25th of March the cherry, plum, and pear trees were in full bloom. An extraordinary mild winter was that of 1782-3. A rose was plucked in an open garden, in New Street, on 30th December, 1820. In December, 1857, a wren's nest, with two eggs in it was found near Selly Oak, and ripe raspberries were gathered in the Christmas week at Astwood Bank. The winter of 1883-4 is worthy of note, for rose trees were budding in December, lambs frisking about in January, and blackbirds sitting in February.
Milk.—The reports of the Borough Analyst for several successive years, 1879 to 1882, showed that nearly one-half the samples of milk examined were adulterated, the average adulteration of each being as much as 20 per cent.; and a calculation has been made that the Brums pay £20,000 a year for the water added to their milk! Next to the bread we eat, there is no article that should be kept freer from adulteration than milk, and the formation of a Dairy Company, in April, 1882, was hailed as a boon by many. The Company started with a nominal capital of £50,000 in £5 shares, and it rigidly prosecutes any farmer who puts the milk of the "wooden cow" into their cans.