Persons who have never travelled--and very many of those
who have, from neglecting to analyse their own performances--entertain
very erroneous views on these matters.
Rate of Movement to measure.--a. When the length of pace etc., is known
before beginning, to observe.--A man or a horse walking at the rate of
one mile per hour, takes 10 paces in some ascertainable number of
seconds, dependent upon the length of his step. If the length of his step
be 30 inches, he will occupy 17 seconds in making 10 paces. Conversely,
if the same person counts his paces for 17 seconds, and finds that he has
taken 10 in that time, he will know that he is walking at the rate of
exactly 1 mile per hour. If he had taken 40 paces in the same period, he
would know that his rate had been 4 miles per hour; if 35 paces, that it
had been 3.5, or 3 1/2 miles per hour. Thus it will be easily
intelligible, that if a man knows the number of seconds appropriate to
the length of his pace, he can learn the rate at which he is walking, by
counting his paces during that number of seconds and by dividing the
number of his paces so obtained, by 10. In short the number of his paces
during the period in question, gives his rate per hour, in miles and
decimals of a mile, to one place of decimals. I am indebted to Mr.
Archibald Smith for this very ingenious notion, which I have worked into
the following Tables.
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