MILE. A measure of length in common use in (heat Britain and the 'United States and their colonies. The name is also in use on the Conti nent of Europe to designate generally a much larger measure of length, although the official measure is now generally the kilometer. It it derived from the Roman milliare, which con tained 1000 paces (mille passuum) of 5 Roman feet each. the pace being the length of the step made by one foot. The Roman font being between 11.62 and 11.05 English inches. the Roman mile was thus less than the present English mile by from 142 to 144 yards. On the Continent of Europe previous to the gen eral adoption of the metric system, the length of the modern mile in different countries exhibit c•d a remarkable diversity not satisfactorily ac counted for. Before the time of Elizabeth scien tific writers made use of a mile of 5000 English feet, from the notion that this was the Roman mile, forgetting the difference in value between the English and Roman foot. The present Eng lish statute mile was incidentally defined by an act passed in the thirty-fifth year of the reign of Elizabeth to be "S furlongs of 40 perches of feet, each"—i.e. 1760 yards of :3 feet each— and it. has since retained this value. The geo graphic, nautical, or sea mile is variously de fined as (a) the length of a minute of latitude at any point, (b) the mean length of a minute of latitude (6082.66 feet), and (e) the length
of a minute of longitude on the equator (6087.15 feet). The United States Coast Survey has adopted as the standard geographic mile the length of a minute of latitude of a sphere having the same surface as the earth. This gives a length of 6080.27 feet. The British Admiralty mile is 6080 feet. As the United States statute mile is 5280 feet, a netlike) mile is 1.15155 statute miles, or 1853.24 meters. For ordinary purposes of navigation the nautical mile is as sumed to be equal to a minute of latitude in the region navigated, the error being inappreciable in the calculations.
The following table gives the length, in English statute miles. of the various miles that have been or are commonly used: Eng. miles English geographical mile —1.153 German geographical mile — 4.1111 Tuscan mile = 1.027 Ancient Scotch mile = 1.127 Irish mile = 1.273 German short mile = 3.897 Prussian mile ..._ 4.680 Danish mile — 4.684 Hungarian mile = 5.178 Swiss mile -- 5.201 German long mile = 5.753 Hanoverian mile = 6.568 Swedish mile = 6.648 = 0.621 and 29 kil. = 18 English statute miles nearly See WEIGHTS AND MEASURES and METRIC SYSTEM.